Microsoft backflips on external Hotmail access
Adam Turner wonders if it's too late for Microsoft to win back Hotmail users after spitting in their faces for so long.
Microsoft is finally opening up Hotmail to POP3 access, allowing users to send and receive email from mobile phones and a wide variety of desktop mail applications. Such a thing would seem like a no-brainer when you're fighting against a behemoth like Google and its Gmail service, but Microsoft isn't exactly known for putting the needs of customers first.
For a long time external access to Hotmail via the POP3 protocol was restricted to users with a paid Hotmail Plus account. Even so, you could access Hotmail from a range of devices and widgets using the WebDAV standard - but only if you had an old Hotmail account. Users who signed up after 2004 were forced to pay for Hotmail Premium if they wanted WebDAV access. Like I said, Microsoft don't like to make things easy.
Last year Microsoft announced plans to cut WebDAV access completely, switching to its proprietary DeltaSync format. This meant third party webmail accounts and desktop mail clients including Outlook Express and Windows Mail would no longer be able to access Hotmail accounts. The only way you'd be able to access your Hotmail account was via the Windows Live website and instant messaging application or via Microsoft Outlook 2003/07 using a plugin. Later an exemption was granted to Blackberry users. I'd already ditched Outlook and Windows Live Messenger in the move from XP to Leopard, and I wasn't going back just for Hotmail access.
Like many people, I've still got my old Hotmail account which I signed up for in the mid-90s - before Microsoft came on board and buggered it up. By the late 90s I'd switched to using Yahoo! as my primary personal account and I've never been tempted to switch back. These days my Hotmail account is little more than a spam trap. I was using it as the address I'd give to online stores and services when I didn't want to get spammed (which perhaps explains the high level of spam), and to access Windows Live Messenger. Of course I've got a handful of Gmail accounts as well, both for work and for lurking around the place.
These days I use Fastmail for my work email, which lets me create plenty of aliases for signing up to online shopping and services. I can also use Yahoo! Messenger to talk to my friends who are using Windows Live Messenger, although Yahoo! Messenger on Leopard is a resource-hungry dog so I've started using Adium instead. As such I've little use for Hotmail. My Fastmail account was checking my Hotmail account via WebDAV to pick up the occasional important email from one of the web services, such as Amazon conformations.
Anyway, when Hotmail announced it was ditching WebDAV last year, I decided the time had come to ditch Hotmail. I started migrating all my Hotmail online accounts across to Fastmail aliases, which actually made life easier and I wondered why I didn't do it sooner.
The death of Hotmail WebDAV access was the perfect catalyst for users to jump across to Gmail, but it seems enough Hotmail users kicked up a fuss so the WebDAV deadline was extended indefinitely last year. Now Microsoft has swung in the other direction, declaring a Hotmail POP3 free-for-all in Australia and some other countries. There's still no sign of IMAP access.
So will I be reacquainting myself with Hotmail? Not bloody likely. Why would I want to put my email in the hands of a vendor that can't even make up its mind as to how I can access the service? Who is to say Microsoft won't cut POP3 and WebDAV access next year? As someone who lives on email, I need certainty from my providers.
If you're still using Hotmail, my advice is to jump ship while you can and find an email provider which puts the needs of users first, rather than last.
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