The Launch of the Web Based E-mail Service by Google Inc.

Richard Ivey School of Business University of Western Ontario

Birth of Gmail A web based E-mail Service

On April 1, 2004 Google Inc. announced the launch of Gmail. A free of charge web based E-mail service. Allowed users up to 1 gigabyte of storage capacity.

Gmails Primary Interface

Focusing on 1 Gigabyte Storage Space

1 Gigabyte of storage space for its users

100 MB of storage space for its basic accounts

Initial Storage space of 2MB

Googles Brainchild Formation

Formed in 1998 as Google Inc. with a seed funding of $100,000 by founder of Sun Micro Systems in Menlo Park California.

On September 21, 1999, the Google.com came off beta ( for public use)

Located online at www.google.com, the site claimed to have nearly every website in the world indexed and made searchable to anyone.

What Does the word Google mean?

The word Google comes from the mathematical representation of the word Googol which is expressed as the numeric figure one followed by hundred zeroes.

1 googol = 1.0 10100

Google Inc Revenue Generation

The company generated revenues through products like AdWords, AdSense and Google Search Application(GSA)

Self served, auction based advertising program that allowed advertisers to specify the relevant search or content topics for each of their ads.

It allows publishers in the Google Network of content sites to serve automatic text, image, video, and rich media adverts that are targeted to site content and audience.

Is a web search engine owned by Google Inc. It is the most-used search engine on the World Wide Web, receiving several hundred million queries each day through its various services.

Gmail An Independent Project from Google Inc.

In 2003, Google earned a profit of $105.6 million. Devoted 20% of their time to work on independent projects.

Google News, AdSense and Gmail were a part of those independent projects.

Gmail making it Off Beta

Started making the Beta testing, involving around few thousands users in the 3 6 months beta testing. Interested users were informed that their e-mail would be scanned by Googles computer; not by humans.

Gmail incorporated keyboard shortcuts that allowed users to move around messages; for example, O opened a message, N moved to the next message and C composed a new message increasing user accessibility and mobility.

Offered POP and IMAP forwarding allowing users to create local copies of messages.

Gmails Revenue Generation

Revenues would be generated from advertising based on keywords scanned from messages and delivered over the service. Google would scan the message instantaneously, examine the scan of the e-mail and extract what Google termed as concepts to target relevant ads.

Whenever the user clicked on any Advertisement, the Advertiser would be able to see the users Internet Protocol(IP) address instantly.

To protect the user interest, Gmail would not deliver Pop ups or Banner Ads.

Gmails Tracking of Personal Information of the User

Whenever a person used Google search, a tracking cookie was updated on the computer therefore whenever he opened his mailbox, the related search would be visible laterally. Collected the information during the Sign up phase and link it up with the search history.

Google could match personal information such as name, e-mail address, postal address to subjects the user had search previously.

The same data could be invaluable to businesses and law enforcement agencies to track a specific individual.

Google Back Up Services

Google used to keep a back up of the users messages in case of system crash by making a copy of the mailbox. Even after the e-mail was deleted, it was stored for indeterminate amount of time on Googles Server.

Storage served many purposes including maintaining good customer services.

Though this technical infrastructure created an odd situation regarding the legal rights of the individual which was potentially affected by Google.

Discrepancy with the Privacy Groups

The Center for Democracy did not accept the storage policy of Google. Google stated that it was a standard procedure for any e-mail service provider to store information even after its termination

Privacy Groups in US denounced Googles Plan.

Privacy International filed complaints with privacy and data protection regulators among 17 countries in Europe along with Canada and Australia.

Legislation Wanted to put a Ban on Gmail

On April 12, 2004, a democratic California State Senator announced that she was drafting a legislation to block Gmail.

The Reason was It could scan incoming e-mails and place advertising in personal messages after searching them for keywords. On April 21, 2004, Walla, an Israeli Web portal announced plans to launch a free e-mail service with 1 Gigabyte of storage space.
They were not happy with Gmails model of generating revenues, but they hoped to be ahead of Gmail, though they did not comment on how it would generate revenues.

Googles Re-positioning Message to its Audience

Google respects the privacy of the individual that use Google Search Engine Services(GSA), buy not willfully disclosing the information to any third party without the individuals permission. Google uses cookie to improve the services, it stores user preferences in cookies and tracks user trends and patterns of searches.

Google does not disclose the cookies to third parties unless demanded by any legal process such as search warrant or court order.

Gmails Further Development Present Scenario

On April 24, 2012, Gmail announced the increase of free storage in Gmail from 7.5 GB to 10 GB ("and counting")

Personalization in Gmail
Gmail introduced HD themes that can be used as a Home Page Background while the user is signed into Gmail. Adding a personal image to ones email gives one the highest form of uniqueness, as compared to standard backgrounds that have been there.

In November 2011, Gmail came up with more customization of its web based mail services.

Personalization of the Home Page

Gmail Code Change

Gmail's JavaScript was rewritten in the middle of 2007 and was released to users starting on October 29, 2007. The new version had a redesigned contacts section, quick contacts box and chat popups, which were added to names in the message list as well as the contact list.

These coding changes mean that only users of Internet Explorer 7, Firefox 2, Google Chrome and Safari 3.0 (or more recent versions) are officially supported by Gmail and can fully use the new code.

Limitations of Gmail to the User

Gmail does not allow users to send or receive executable files or archives containing executable files if it recognizes the file extension as one used for executable files or archives. Before September 29, 2010, Gmail sorted email only by conversations (threads), which can be a problem for large conversations. As a result of complaints from some users, Google made conversation view optional starting September 29, 2010.

Gmails Secured Connection

Gmail accounts of human rights activists in China were hacked in sophisticated attacks thought to use phishing and exploit a vulnerability in Internet Explorer in late 2009.

Any (web mail or other) mail system which stores and retains user's email contents is an attractive target for such attacks.

Gmail is popular with security-conscious users because of its early HTTPS secure (encrypted) connection support, and its more-recent HTTPS-only default setting.

Launching of Google + A Multilingual Social Network

It was launched in June 28, 2011. As of September 2012, it has a total of 400 million registered users of whom 100 million are active on a monthly basis.
On September 20, 2011, Google+ was opened to everyone 18 years of age or older without the need for an invitation.

President Obama answered questions about the State of the Union posed by citizens in the first-ever completely virtual interview from the White House. Aired live on the official White House Google+ page on January 30, 2012 at 5.30 pm.

Google + Home Page with the Unique +1 Button similar to Facebook

Gmail Moves into the IOS

On 16th November, 2011, Gmail launched its web based e-mail application for Apple IOS operating system.

Gmail IOS App goes compatible with all devices running on IOS 4 and beyond.

Running on iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch.

Interface of Gmail for iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch

Gmails Interface for Android Devices

Functional Differences Between Gmail, Hotmail and Yahoo Mail

Whom Does Google Share Information With?

Google shares information about the user with Advertisers, Business Partners and Sponsorers. Google can disclose how frequently the average Google user visits Google or which other query words are most often used.

Google does changes its Privacy Policies, when done, they keep the user aware about the changes, so that they are informed about what information is collected, how they use it and on what circumstances they disclose it.