Hotmail is dead. Microsoft (MSFT) has completed the transition from Hotmail to the new Outlook.com. The Hotmail replacement has more than 400 million accounts. According to a blog entry at Office.com most Hotmail users will not notice much difference. They can continue to use those accounts as long as they choose and can claim an Outlook email address whenever they like.
Writing in the company blog, Dick Craddock, Outlook.com’s group program manager said that Hotmail had more than 300 million active accounts that had to be moved. MSFT completed the epic live upgrade in only six weeks. The upgrade from Hotmail to Outlook.com required communicating with hundreds of millions of people, upgrading all their mailboxes, and making sure they preserved every email, calendar, contacts, folders, and personal preference.
The new Outlook email client has several different features from Hotmail, such as two-factor authentication, an updated calendar, and app as well as integration with cloud service Skydrive and Skype. it allowed users to connect easily with Facebook (FB), Twitter, and LinkedIn (LNKD).
GigaOm reports that MSFT will even allow collaboration with Google users. They report that:
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.. if you’re reading an email from a Gmail user, you can reply with a chat icon from your Outlook.com inbox. Or, if you and your Google-oriented buddy are collaborating on a document in Microsoft Skydrive (as opposed to, say, Google Drive), you can send an instant message to your Google contact with the click of a button. Microsoft is also rolling out Google Chat integration.
All of these new features haven’t thrilled everyone, Mr. Craddock is quoted in the IBT, “Of course, whenever a widely used consumer service makes any substantial change, there will always be some folks that don’t like it, and that shows up in the feedback…”
Hotmail was one of the first web-based email services. Founded by Sabeer Bhatia and Jack Smith it was launched on July 4 1996 as “HoTMaiL”. Microsoft bought the web email service in 1997 for an estimated $400 million, and it was rebranded as “MSN Hotmail”.
Outlook.com was launched in February 2013. It’s based around Microsoft’s Metro design language, and closely mimics the user interface of Microsoft Outlook.
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For anyone who has ever had to be involved in a hot email upgrade, you should recognize the technical feat moving Hotmail to Outlook.com really was despite occasional problems. During most email system upgrades, anything that can go wrong will go wrong. There will be power or network issues that will interrupt the mailbox transfer across the wire, there will be users with 32 Gb of email messages, there will be people who file their active messages in the trash can (yes, I’ve seen it) there will be strange shared calendars and accounts that just won’t transfer unless you move them item by item to find the corruption.
Kudos to MSFT for migrating Hotmail to Outlook.com, lets see if it matters in the face of Google’s (GOOG) Gmail and Doc’s.
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Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers, and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.
The next stop on the Farewell Steve tour takes up to Windows XP. The Verge reports that Steve Ballmer, who attended Lawrence Technological University in Southfield, MI before he moved on, had an hour-long town hall in the Microsoft (MSFT) HQ in Redmond to bid the MSFT worker bees adieu. At one point The Verge says an emotional Ballmer paused to “enjoy this for a minute,” with tears visibly streaming down his face. He told the audience “You work for the greatest company in the world, soak it in.”
