Lifehacker: Is Thunderbird, Desktop Email Dying Out?
by Volker Weber
There was a time when Mozilla's email client, Thunderbird, was just as exciting a game-changer as Firefox. These days, we can't help but wonder if Thunderbird—and most desktop email, for that matter—is doomed.
Comments
Email archiving is important to me. I have 5 to 7 years of pop3 mail backed up. I use two different thunderbird plug-ins. One is called Mbox import/export, and the other is remove duplicates.
If my gmail account gets hacked, or I forget my password, or I don't login for a year and my account is closed, I have the archived email in Thunderbird.
Gmail has alot of benefits (you can search across all email, not just one account), but it does seem less user friendly than Thunderbird.
I'm liking the google docs, tasks, and calendar integration - especially since it synchs with Calendar on the mac with CalDav.
Gmail only lets you pull in 5 pop3 accounts though. I have more than that.
I also access email from several different machines. If I configure my Thunderbird clients on those machines to use IMAP, then my mail is synched between machines (deletions/sent mail, etc).
So far Gmail is great, and free, and allows 7GB of disk space (at least for me).
But I still remember how I used to use hotmail in the early days, when it was primarily used by backpackers keeping up with their families while traveling. I stopped using it quite a while ago, because of limited disk space (when gmail came along things changed) , harassing ads, etc. Currently, logging into Microsoft based system whether is be Windows Live Messenger, or Hotmail is annoying with all of the ads, and the information collection on signup seems too intrusive, etc.
A free service that I relied on that changed left a bad taste in my mouth...but then again, hey it was free, so why should I have complained.
I probably would be using webmail if there was an easy way to get it running on my server.
I'm running Thunderbird - sometimes. My problem is by moving mails inside my Gmail account to other folders (e.g FolderXY) with Tunderbird. After logging in to Gmail they are labeled with "Inbox" and "FolderXY". My solution GmailNotifier for Firefox and sometimes I use roundcube mail as web client for my own domain.
I'm am finding "Mail" with the Mac is great. The search option on the mac is just as good as google one.
I personally would prefer the stuff local anyway in the event something happens on Google end.
I can see why people think it is doomed. It is a bit like backing up. People don't appreciate backing up until they have lost everything.
Postbox looks like a suitable successor to the T-Bird from my point of view...
Well Firefox makes tons of money with their ads implementation, Thunderbird doesn't make any money. Last time I checked the Mozilla Foundation had more than 75 Mio $ in cash with more than 20 Mio $ earnings a year. I am still using Thunderbird but also Roundcube webmail and sometimes Mac mail. I use IMAP so it does not really matter what client I choose. They all work fine with my courier mailserver. Real open standards are a good thing.
Thunderbid always struck me as a "me too" product, plain and simple POP and IMAP, nothing really exciting, those have been around for ages.
