Webmail

Webmail is a World Wide Web interface that allows users to read and write E-mail using a Web browser.

Webmail is commonly offered as a service by Internet companies, sometimes in exchange for providing personal information for marketing purposes. It may also be offered by one's Internet service provider for remote access to a regular email account. There are many Open source programs that allow one to set up an HTTP mail user agent (see exteral link below).

Features

Most webmail services have the following features:

• folders
• filtering (incoming email to dispatch to related folder)
• trash folder
• address book

Several webmail services offer the following features:

• spam e-mail detection
• POP3 mail retrieval
• anti-virus checking of mail attachments
• dictionary and thesaurus when composing messages
• spell checker

Advantages of webmail services

• Email can be read and composed anywhere a person has access to a web browser and an internet connection.
• Messages do not have to be downloaded.
• Many services allow anonymous sign-ups.

Disadvantages of webmail services

• The user must stay online to read and write more than one email. They cannot easily save mails they are working on (except by cutting and pasting the text).
• Commercial webmail services often offer only limited email storage space and either display advertisements during use or append them to mails sent. Unlike with a local client, the user cannot keep the messages on their local hard drive.
• Webmail can be hampered by a slow network connection.
• Most emails are usually short, plain text messages of less than 2k, but using webmail the original email is wraped in HTML that can be 40k or more. Obviously this brings a significent decrease in speed of use.

Other features of webmail

• Webmail accounts can be set up and discarded quickly, thus can provide a degree of anonymity.
• The ability to access it anywhere means it is harder to trace the individual who uses an account than if they used a connection associated with their home address.

These features mean it can in theory be more easily used as a communication tool for nefarious purposes (or for avoiding oppressive authorities) than conventional e-mail. In practice, most governments security agencies are fairly easily able to track individuals who try to use such methods, just as with someone who calls from phone booths. Ordinary citizens will find it more difficult, however.

History

Historically, the first webmail service was Hotmail, created in 1995 by Sabeer Bhatia of India. Hotmail became very popular, and was later bought by Microsoft and rebranded MSN Hotmail. In early 2004, Google announced the arrival of Gmail, a free webmail solution set to undergo a period of widespread beta testing before its projected release in the fall of 2004. New features such as a 1 GB storage limit and conversation threading were accepted by many users to the degree that beta accounts were being auctioned off on eBay due to the exceptionally high level of interest. There are now many other webmail services available.

There is webmail software available that allows one to create one's own webmail server, notably open source software such as