November recap- Email reigns and OtherInbox shines!

December 8 2010, 6:30pm

Last week, as we at OtherInbox HQ (OIB) watched November melt away under the Austin sun, we took a respite, gathered and realized… Holy Kaw! November was a tremendous month for us! The tech topic of the month was, our specialty, email. We like when people talk email because it so very rarely gets any of the tech spotlight. It’s the kind of thing whose weight you don’t notice until it’s down or unavailable! But alas, we still take it for granted, bitch about it even! Folks talk about how it’s an ancient, dying art and sing the praises of the new sleeker, faster and younger communique… however they do it all …via email! Facebook, aol, InboxLove…. All kinds of cool email things went down last month and our increased traffic and sign-up rates reflect how OIB is very well regarded in this topic!aolFirst, by about 12 hours and on a Sunday, aol beats Facebook to a major email announcement, unveiling Project Phoenix, their revamped aol mail coming early next year.Phoenix now offers a improved, beautiful interface, media rich features, cross messaging and more. I’ve been using it for a couple of weeks and think it’s amazing! It’s very well thought out from a UX (user experience) standpoint and works great! Note-Having an email suffix like @love.com is also super cool!From Business Insider.com- “Email remains one of the most vital communication tools despite all of the new sites and apps available to consumers today,” said Brad Garlinghouse, President of AOL’s Consumer Applications Group. “There is still so much innovation to be done in the space and Project Phoenix is just the beginning. We see a huge opportunity to disrupt email in a big way. AOL is the company that brought everyone online, and now we’re making it simpler and more enjoyable to be there.”Bring it Brad. We love it so far! FacebookThe very next day, Facebook live streamed a press conference and announced their “Project Titan.” Now, we’ll assume you know all about this aggregate messaging system and likely have even tried it. Project Titan has been talked about by pretty much everyone in the tech biz. Here, CNET’s Rafe Needleman is brought in to give his insights.

So maybe it was not the “Gmail Killer” the press made it out to be, but we think the model is definitely cool, disruptive to the status quo and a great way to stay in touch with people. Especially IF your mom, dad and friends are all on Facebook. (Great play on FB’s part to help ensure sign-ups.) InboxLoveLater that same week, we were in San Jose for InboxLove, a joint venture by ourselves OtherInbox, Jared Goralnick, founder of AwayFind and 500 Startups.InboxLove was a series of moderated talks and discussions, held over a fancy dinner, all about one thing: Email.InboxLove was attended by all the big email players! Yahoo!, Hotmail, Gmail, and yes, even Facebook. InboxLove was a big hit and, save the date and submit your proposal, will be back in 2011! All this email talk meant our guy, Joshua Baer, was in high demand! ReadWriteWeb and yes, even Rafe Needleman reported on Organizer and called on us! “So what’s the future of email? Is email dead?”That was the query of the month. We saw it everywhere. “We don’t think that a modern messaging system is going to be email.” said Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg.We might agree, except for the fact that we really like email! It allows us to get back to people on our own time. We can sign up for marketing or commercial correspondence and read them when we want. (Do you really want texts or IMs from your favorite online merchants?) An email string allows us to keep a running track of how a project or day is going. Finally, we’d be remiss without the subject line! The subject line helps quickly establish context and audience. I mean, crafting a well-thought-out and effective subject line is one of the best things about having to work within the confines of well… Work! No one ever told me “Nice text J-Ro. Very succinct and professional. We got the account!” LOLEmail simply needs a little help and perhaps some improved rules of engagement. For now, it is made much better and more productive by smarter filtering and organization. Which is exactly why we are here and why last month was so turbo with press and analytic activity for us here at OtherInbox…. Because… email still rulz. And you can’t get twitter, Facebook, flickr, myspace, hi-5, WordPress, iTunes or anything without authenticating with and keeping up with, what else, your email address. So, go ahead. Sign up for whatever. We got your back with Organizer.What do you think? What’s the future of email? Comment below, here, there or everywhere. PS- I still miss Google Wave.