Microsoft has upgraded its Quick Add feature in Hotmail, first announced earlier this year, with a number of features from their new Bing search engine.
We’re not talking about a small number of users who will be affected. Hotmail is still by far the largest web mail provider on the Internet, with 343 million monthly users according to Comscore. Second and third are Yahoo (285 million) and Gmail (146 million). A year ago Hotmail had just 273 million users, so it is still growing rapidly.
The new features let users search for and insert maps, movie listings and times, in addition to the restaurants, videos, images and business listings that were there before. And all of these have been upgraded with Bing functionality via the API.
Some of these quick adds are quite useful, particularly the maps and movie listings. For the masses that use Hotmail, it’s also a great way to introduce them to Bing.
Screen shots below:
“A year ago Hotmail had just 273 million users, so it is still growing rapidly.”
Really? I’m shocked at that. Probably not true in the US tho, am I right?
that’s worldwide.
Yeah, sure. What I mean is I suspect they’re not growing in the US even tho they are in other parts of the world.
Anyone reading this that still uses hotmail or yahoo needs to trot on over to gmail and git outta the 90s.
Hotmail is Famously used. So people will surely use it. They are still not used to Gmail’s name.
If my inbox is any indication, 200 million of those users are spambots.
these features not there in gmail.. they make some “lab” features and announce feature in nobody-reads-blog and 0.001% users use.
i agree with you.
Realistically, I believe this will cause a initial short burst of spike in Bing usage, then the usage trend will die down a bit.
In terms of long term perspective, I do see Bing as a real competitor to Google, simply because it is continuously adding real value to the user.
But It’s Not Google?
I need to force myself to use Bing so I get a feel for it and see if it’s worth it to ’switch’. Somehow it still has that MS stench to it in the back of my head… but maybe … with the latest OS market developments … MS is not the ‘bad guy’ anymore.
It’s off topic but I doubt they’ll be able to pull similar tricks on Goog that they did on poor old Netscpe.
Damn it Mike, get the apostrophe out of your its. How can I keep reading after seeing that thing staring back at me right in the first sentence?
damnit.
Thank you. Nothing personal, just a pet peeve.
Now what’s this about Bing in Hotmail? Hobtimnagil? Sounds like a Microsoft product to me.
this is the kind of thing that keeps MS users happy, a slick integrated experience. most people aren’t interested in religious wars and taking a stand against monopolies, show me a better product and a compelling argument to switch
.
this is the kind of thing that keeps MS users happy, a slick integrated experience. most people aren’t interested in religious wars and taking a stand against monopolies, show me a better product and a compelling argument to switch
.
Any Gmail growth figures? Could it be that Hotmail grows faster than Gmail?
Obviously it does. Maybe because it’s integrated into Window$? Just a hunch there.
Hmm.. I’ve researched this a bit. In February 2008 Gmail had 48% year-over-year growth, some sources predicted that Gmail will surpass Hotmail by the end of 2009. However, in 2008 Gmail’s growth rate decreased (all geeks registered already?) and Hotmail’s accelerated, so we obviously won’t see Gmail surpassing Hotmail in 2009.
Note that most sources give “monthly unique visitors”, not “total registered users” data; those parameters are highly correlated, for sure, but I guess Hotmail has more inactive users that Gmail.
this is going to be Bing!
Hey Mike, could you have sounded any more excited about this?! We all know its Microsoft but c’mon spread the enthusiasm a bit more evenly.
Sounds invigorating, but I’ll stick with Gmail just for the comfort of it.
Plus it’s not swamped with banners and blinking things.
Come on Pavlo. Something Google is not the best at? Do you honestly think you can read something like that on any website?
Before all these newbies discovered the computers and the Internet, i was using Altavista and i was loving it. More and more people started using and talking about Google, and i tried it many times and didn’t like it for a long time. Then, all of a sudden, it was almost impossible to use Altavista anymore, and i believe there is a simple reason of that : Google was very popular and Search Engine Optimization is not that easy, so people were registering on Google only. I used Live Search many times, but didn’t like it.
But you should try Bing. It has the same “somehow better” results that once Altavista had. The only way to try is to make it the default search engine on your browser and wait a few days.
Well, I’m already using Bing: as a geek, I try everything new and [potentially] exciting. And Hotmail as well, I use it as a PUSH-email account on Windows Mobile.
I don’t think your Google conspiracy theory is true, though. Google is just not that powerful.. yet.
See “Consumers Could Pay For Google’s Power”
http://www.lati...0,283957.column
wow! … interesting … i think what Hotmail needs is good keyboard shortcuts, otherwise, its pretty good, clean tool … of course i use shorter and more elegant address of http://www.live.com ……. well, so, when are they rolling @bing.com email addresses out? … just for that heck of it :]
earlier it was Bing that got the accolades and I think it’s the turn for Hotmail now. Long time since it got a bosst hopefully hotmail will eventually get some market share back from the competitors. as for Hotmail is growing came as a surprise to me honestly.
Sonal Maheshwari
USourceIT your single source for all IT needs
Another search engine war
I think we should remeber the fact that for most user you need an hotmail account to use MSN MESSENGER.
Using passports , and stuff isnt populare in the avarage IT user.
There are many example of people having both gmail/hotmail(msn) account or yahoo/hotmail(msn).
Uhm. You can use any Windows Live ID, whether it’s a Hotmail account or any other email address. Windows Live Messenger doesn’t care.
Does anyone but Bots use hotmail anymore? That alone would account for the growth
Bing keeps making me think of the word “bling” – there is something trashy about it.
I was an enthusiastic convert when gmail came. Years later my gmail account is all but closed. The only mails i get there is spam. And if there are any real mail in there, I can’t find it in the heap of spam. And by the way, all you hotmail bashers…. use it before you trash it. Gmail takes years to load and often fails to reach the finish line. And when it opens, you’re greeted by a drab look and interface which I thought was left behind in the 19th century. And what the hell…. you have g-talk where the status message I put in 2006 December cannot be found and hence cannot be changed!! You have video in g-talk now which you can only use on gmail page and file transfer which you can only use in g-talk mode. I mean what the hell. I even told my friends whom i chatted using g-talk to switch to something better or lose me as a friend. Guess what, they switched to windows live messenger or yahoo. And someone said blinkys and banners??? Who looks at them anyway? They’re just like FM radio playing in the background. What aout Google Search though. Hmmm… tell you what? Its a sure shot way of not finding what you want and getting diverted towards something else. There’s so much of pretty trash on there. Thank God they had Live and now Bing (which is not too much of a change but still better). Use it a few times. You’ll soon know how goog has been conning you into complacency.
nice!
next gen email is really emerging, did you know all these features are available for gmail and y!mail already?
best, bostjan
This feature is not on Y! and G ! Gmail does not have half of the stationary that can be used while composing an email. You cannot search at the same time in the same window while composing an email either in yahoo or gmail and insert results of the search in the email. Personally, I love that feature.
Sounds like a good move, but I think I will stick with Gmail for the time being, especially since my Gmail username reflects my name as well unlike for Hotmail/Yahoo.
those stats really surprised me.. like really.
Integration across apps has been a strong point for MS. Google so far has done that better online.
If MS does this well, i.e. integrating everything around Bing, then it would become quite interesting. With office online (freemium probably?), they could muscle back into contention.
This is an awesome feature. I just was composing an email and now I can search on bing on the right pane, say searh restaurants, movies, maps, etc… and directly insert results in the email. Wow..this is fun to play with..email is evolving !!! I use gmail and hotmail. Gmail though is faster, but few milliseconds won’t hurt me to use Live Mail..For some reason, I am more attracted towards Live/Hotmail now. The interface and the features are awesome. Forgot to mention, this feature is not on Gmail.
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