The Blogoscoped version of What If Gmail Had Been Designed by Microsoft?, which Charles has blogged below, is amusing, but does it have anything to do with reality?
Microsoft has already designed its own version of Gmail, and it's called Windows Live Hotmail. What does it look like? See above -- you can click the image for a full-ized version. (I don't actually use Live Hotmail so I had to send myself some email to fill up the box. Maybe lack of use is why I didn't get the expected banner ad along the top.)
Unlike Gmail, I have the option to set a Reading Pane either down the side or across the bottom, which would make it look more like Outlook. But that's a matter of choice.
Unlike Gmail, Live Hotmail provides folders so I can grab a bunch of emails and drag and drop them somewhere out of the way. (Yes, I know how to use labels. I even know how to use the "virtual folders" in Outlook. But I find labels tedious and time-consuming.)
And although Hotmail used to require users to log on every month (not every fortnight, Charles!), the Live version does not. Now you have 120 days.
Live Hotmail also provides 5GB of space -- which may be more than you have on Gmail, unless you've been updated.
OK, I use and recommend Gmail rather than Live Hotmail, but that's not what it's about. My point is that Microsoft already has a Gmail-style Ajax-based email service, and it doesn't resemble the fictional version on Blogoscoped.
That's fine, but to avoid being misleading, perhaps Blogoscoped should have put Joke on the top of its post.
