Jake Hughes
The Paw Print
Don’t you just hate it when social media entities and other forms of communications change the style of your interface or merge with a totally unwanted party? Microsoft’s Hotmail.com is now officially merging and being replaced with Outlook.com, whether you like it or not. Outlook’s popularity skyrocketed over the time it has been in operation.
Over the period of six months, Outlook has catered to sixty million active users and spurred Microsoft to deactivate their old email service provider. A spokesperson from Microsoft has stated that the merge has already begun and should be in full motion by the summer. Thanks for the heads-up, Microsoft! Outlook—which asks a lot of Gmail—is an intelligent service provider with a clean, contemporary and aesthetically pleasing interface design. Outlook boasts new, easy and effective features such as inbox sweep and scheduled cleanups.
These new features have allowed Outlook to be viable as a main address or a spam account, which adds to its popularity. According to Wilson Rothman—a reporter from NBC—when David Law, director of product management of Outlook, was asked about how many of the sixty million users converted from Hotmail, he was reluctant to say. However, he did say people would be surprised at how many were fresh accounts. Furthermore, Law stated that almost one-third of Outlook users used to be Gmail users. Critics are predicting that the rise in popularity of Outlook could save Microsoft’s battle with Apple.
Experts boast that all Microsoft is missing in the duel between the two giants is Office for iPads, iPhones and Androids—and Microsoft released an app last fall for Android users that allows them to use Outlook on their phones. When partnered with Microsoft’s SkyDrive cloud storage service, the rise in use of Microsoft’s web services give reassurance to the battle of power between Apple and Microsoft. SkyDrive is said to work perfectly on Macs as well as other devices too.
Although Microsoft’s programs are becoming widely accessible and compatible with other machines, Windows suffers the consequences. No matter how much Microsoft tries to save Windows, its other programs are out shining its original system. One problem that Microsoft has come across is the branding of the new web service provider.
Microsoft has had a PR shocker in this. Some people have assumed that the new provider is a managing tool that controls multiple accounts. Sadly, it’s not. It is just like all the other service providers like Gmail and Yahoo. Microsoft is spending millions in advertising to repair and explain the new provider in detail, and I must say they have done a very good job. I have been reluctant to the change, but, after I got over the change, I realized how superior Outlook is to Hotmail. Just like any other change, it takes time to get used to—almost like moving from a PC to a Mac—but when you get used to Outlook, it’s an extremely handy tool to use.
If you have any questions or comments regarding the merge between these two web services, or if you just want to express your opinion about the merge or any other web service, please let me know. It would be a pleasure to hear from you.
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