First impressions of gmail

Michael Gartenberg | May 03, 2004, 09:12 PM

Thanks to some kind folks at Google, I just received my invite to gmail. Setting up the account was painless and took less than a minute. So far the system is quick and responsive. The ads don't bother me any more than Google's other ads do, which is to say they are totally unobtrusive and far less annoying than ads from other services. The keyboard shortcuts are nice and I can definitely see using this as a primary personal account over time. Some stuff that's missing is the ability to import an address book for contacts and automated rules system for dealing with incoming mail. I expect that stuff will be added over time. Bottom line is that gmail is something special and quite different from the status quo of what's out there (sort of like Google itself was to other search engines.). The ads may be an issue but I suspect that most folks are going to find enough value to justify their presence.