What is Digg?127 Comments
- psylence, on 10/12/2007, -5/+340 to 100 would be infinite growth...
- helix400, on 10/12/2007, -2/+25As much as I love gmail over Hotmail, this is comparing apples to oranges, and doesn't tell us anything helpful.
gmail is relatively new. So it is bound to have huge growth percentages. Hotmail is a matured email program used by millions around the world. I'm actually impressed they got it to grow by 16%. - Angostura, on 10/12/2007, -4/+26Let's do the maths using the actual figures from the article:
Customers
2005
=====
Hotmail: 3,380,000
GMail: 290,000
2006
=====
Hotmail: 3,910,000
GMail: 447,000
So that's 530,000 new Hotmail customers and 157,000 new Gmail customers.
So the alternative headline: "Hotmail adds 3 times as many new customers in one year as Gmail". - databyss, on 10/12/2007, -0/+171 to 2 would be 100% growth.
- dioscaido, on 10/12/2007, -0/+14Gotta love percentages.
Try this headline: "Hotmail australia grows by 530,000 users, while gmail only gained 238,000." - maxomo, on 10/12/2007, -2/+160 to 100 would result in dividing by zero which is an impossibility. 100 to 200 would be 100% growth.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -30/+41for hotmail to grow by anywhere close to 114 then it would have too put up much higher numbers than gmail as the hotmail service has many more members! not a good comparison
Jeff - http://jeffeh.com - cyssero, on 04/18/2009, -0/+11Exactly. A 16% growth for a service which has been around for years is extremely impressive. Weather or not people like admitting it, most people have had a Hotmail account at some stage in their Internet years. I remember before web-mail really had some competition Hotmail was a leader and nothing really came close to it. Yahoo! was good, mainly because it had double the storage space (4MB!). It had pretty poor password requirements though - it had no quarrels letting me use "daza" as the password...
And I think this is only surveying Australian users. If you look at the source it cites an Australian organisation too. That itself is very bias because "95 percent of [Australian] 12-17 year olds log into the service [MSN Messenger] at least twice a week." (Source - http://mess.be ). One of the easiest ways to use MSN Messenger is to have a Hotmail account. I think globally (and digg is global) things would be very different. The article is not quite incorrect, but I think the digg description and the title are slightly misleading. I'm Australian, so I'll give it a digg (ha ha, I'm a digger!) - schurkenstadt, on 10/12/2007, -0/+10yes
- anorris, on 10/12/2007, -0/+9Anything divided by 0 is undefined.
- emb3r, on 10/12/2007, -3/+12My favorite part about this rivalry:
Gmail invites sent to a hotmail or msn email account, are instantly placed in the junk mail folder.
I felt that to be fairly emblematic of the whole situation. - h2d2, on 10/12/2007, -1/+9It's very simple...
Everyone and their mama has a hotmail account; it's been around since 1997. It has remained almost the same since those days.
Gmail was launched just two years ago. It allows limited signups and features a brand new technology and interface.
Is that so hard to understand? Or are we all here just to diss MS? - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -1/+9estvir... your math skillz make me sad :-(
- anorris, on 10/12/2007, -3/+9Keep in mind that its likely the vast majority of the new Hotmail accounts aren't new users, rather simply new accounts. I have friends who get fed up with spam and have been through 5 accounts in 3 years at Hotmail, all of which are still technically "active" and would count towards that total.
- TheCount, on 10/12/2007, -1/+7Let me tell you a little story about statisticians...
Two statisticians go are duck hunting one day, they send their dog out to scare a bird and it takes to the sky. The first statistician shots too high, the second statistician shoots too low. They both grin at each other, giving each other high fives as they exclaim, "Got Him!"
Contrary to popular belief, numbers do lie at times. - estvir, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4the same thing is true, or even more so for gmail.
also, what you said means nothing, because not only do you not have proof of this happening (though i'm not saying it isn't), but gmail suffers from the exact same 'use' as any email service, that being people creating multiple accounts. - wired4u, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5I sent an invite
- wizpig64, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4anything to the zeroth power (7^0) equals 1.
- Agret, on 10/12/2007, -2/+6Does it matter how big the mailbox is when the interface sucks ass? A large mailbox is not the only selling point of gmail...
- Tezkah, on 10/12/2007, -2/+6Yes, it does bother people. If you have a website you want to link that is REVALANT to the story, then by all means, go ahead. Do not simply paste a comment to the end of every post containing a link to your website, trying to drive more traffic to it. If you want a link to your website, put it in your profile. Besides, if you want to whore out your website, go back to slashdot. I make a habit to bury every comment with a "signature" in it, because they are annoying. Thanks.
- zoto, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4You mean you don't already get that with hotmail?
- retral, on 10/12/2007, -2/+5Google is cool because they don't nuke your account after a few weeks of inactivity. I've not accessed a gmail account of mine for at least 3 months at a time and still had it there.
- ZergyPoo, on 10/12/2007, -3/+6My girlfriend gets spam in her inbox on a regular basis. And know several other people who get spam in their inbox pretty frequently on gmail.
See? Anecdotal evidence is fun. - 2fuf, on 10/12/2007, -3/+61 to 101 would be 10100% growth
- muyuu, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4Hotmail has over 100 million users worldwide... once you hit there, it's hard to grow.
When Microsoft bought it, it had some 30 million already, IIRC. I was a hotmail user from before the buyout. Funny they used to be so anti-MS.
I have accounts in both, and then some :D - pomegranate, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4that's probably because it's still in beta
- MaxTheSheep, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3No, hotmail stopped that years ago. Now they send out PSAs.
"DONT DO DRUGS"
Yes sir, Mr. Hotmail! - skipere, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4Done ! you are now a gmail user , want more , let me know I got 99 more to give.
- nocode, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2while it maybe limited, its pretty much unlimited as anyone with a cellphone can sign up for a gmail account. you don't need necessarily need a referral anymore and pretty much everyone has a cellphone.
- mirunit, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3Well I think Yahoo's mail beta is even more clunky than live mail. Gmail might not rule but it will be the most user friendly and streamlined.
- wedgea18, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2I don't like the Xbox 360... what's your point?
Go Revolution!!... er... I mean *sigh* Wii - pongx, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2The best part is that Gmail isn't exactly making a big cut into Hotmail's market share. Hotmail added more users than Gmail has in total. That means that Gmail isn't stealing market share and Microsoft isn't exactly scared. If anything this just shows that GMail is growing SLOWER than Hotmail. After all you need to be able to get more users to sign up to Gmail than Hotmail before you start "losing marketshare".
Stupid reporters. - DOOOMKULTUS, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3I am using Microsoft's Live service and currently my Hotmail space is 2000MB up from 10MB,If the new Microsoft Live keeps its promises(let's hope so),then i think gmail is going to face even tougher challenge.Google v Microsoft.
- cinder, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3So does Gmail (calendar.google.com).
- themajor, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2
mathematically you are right, but practically, things have to start somewhere, so going from 0 to 100 (aka starting a user base) would be infinite growth. But that also is a useless comparison. - ohmar, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2gmail has free pop mail support. I pipe it into Mail in OS X and automatically archive it on the gmail server. Havent checked it since.
- forkburn01, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2i finally signed up for a Hotmail account last year when i was required to be on MSN messenger at my last job. i never once used that email address for anything else (e.g. sign up for something), and yet i presently have about 500 emails in that account. needless to say, they are all spam.
how does that happen, anyway? do spammers just randomly generate email addresses to target? i got my first spam(s) on the day i created that account!
Gmail is infinitely more progressive, and it's quite interesting to see Microsoft constantly on the catch-up on so many fronts these days (obviously, Firefox is also infinitely more progressive). the outcomes (for there will be many) from all this competition should be very, very compelling to watch unfold in the next few years and beyond. - moges, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I had a hotmail account, now I have a gmail account. As far as MS is concerned, I still have a hotmail account, so they count that towards their total. Hotmail is also "pushed" onto Windows users, by way of MSN messenger, and getting MSN messenger to work is unusually difficult (its not DIFFICULT, just more so then it should be). Gmail is restricted from random sign ups, and this turns away a lot of potential customers, but keeps the service running well.
For those that asked: Gmail is available to Aussies only by invitation as far as I know. Google's extensive cell-phone features don't work here :(
Whether Gmail ever gets to the numbers Hotmail did, it doesn't bother me. However, hotmail users should note that if it weren't for Gmail, their accounts probably wouldn't have anywhere near the storage space they do now ;-) - Tezkah, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1okay, then we'll just start block/reporting everyone who pastes advertising into their posts.
ps: I am far less likely to visit a website that is pushed at me via online adverts or otherwise than I am if recommended by a friend, or lured by good content. guess which camp you're in? - UnseenLlama, on 10/12/2007, -2/+3I just logged into my Hotmail account after 2 1/2 weeks... let's see, 520 new messages, all spam, only 27 of the actually flagged as spam...I'll stick to using Gmail.
- Bloekie, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Here's another example of how statistics can manipulate numbers.
In the past year, half a million Hotmail-accounts were created, and 'only' about 250,000 Gmail accounts. I don't think you can choose a winner though. How many people do I know who just create a lot of Hotmail-accounts to spoof contests and stuff? A lot! I think it's a nice margin for both.
And they're right, if they want to put it in percentages, it's bullocks, cause then 3,85 million Hotmail-accounts should have been created last year to make it a "draw", so yeah, I think this is just a stupid article, statisticsway. - miaow, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1most of the new hotmails are probably transient spamers. A lot of my spam seems to come from hotmail. Im surprised people still use them. Last time I had an account I had to go through all that passport stuff and the spam was terrible.
- lnxaddct, on 10/12/2007, -4/+5estvir,
Not quite. GMail's filtering services are by far the best in the industry. Out of around 30,000 emails that I've received with my account, every single spam has been caught and there have been no false positives either. Everyone I know has a gmail account and the most spam that I've ever heard of anyone getting was 2 and it was a newsletter that they didn't want. The interface of gmail is great, but its the backend that really makes it enticing. Everything is fast, responsive and intuitive. Searching through mail is now easier and more accurate than browsing through it, there is intelligent e-mail threads handling, the labels are extremely useful, and its just generally clutter free. Also, Google pretty much guarantees that you're a human, whereas literally every email I've ever received from a hotmail user has been spam. The usage patterns are completely different between the two services, you can't compare them.
-Steve
http://krenzel.info - Ekfud, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Fellas, when I submitted the data for the article, it was intended to provide some tangible numbers for people to think about the active penetration of both services in the AU market.
The main question to be posed at the moment is more about branding - why take the name 'hotmail' which is universally recognised and switch consumers to 'windows live'? While the 'mail service upgrade' may be simple in concept, porting an existing user base somewhere near 5million Australian accounts (let alone internationally) to a freshly branded setup is potentially dangerous in terms of audience leakage.
Think about what that means as a business jump - you have the dominant position in 'free' email and unless a transition is managed well, you are likely to help the guys over the road build their audience. - Pogue_Mahone, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Just an excuse to test out gmail's awesome spam filters.
- TKDWILSON, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1NEWS REPORT!!!!!!
Gmails growth is infinate compared to itself 5 years ago. Hotmails growth isn't near that........
Eric Wilson - diggnationdevon, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1This is definitely not accurate for the United States.
- secretdiffusion, on 10/12/2007, -0/+12fuf, 1 to 101 would be a 10000% increase because 101 is 10100% of 1, but you must take away 100% to get the increase. just as 1 to 2 is a 100% increase and 2 is 200% of 1. Any questions?
- KidVicious, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Hah, you have a .info domain. What a loser.
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