This may affect some people: Microsoft abandons Outlook Express
I guess the trend is towards more and more people reading and writing email on the web. Hotmail users especially, and MS is making more money by pushing Hotmail and the advertising on everyone (in MS Messenger, as part of Windows, etc) than by letting them use Outlok Express for free.
Also, it seems they want more corporate users to use (and pay for) Outlook (the program that comes with Office, not to confuse with OE). Which is silly thinking, because noone in their right mind is going to buy an Office license for every employee just so they can read mail.
It also appears they also don’t care about usenet a lot. With Outlook Express gone, there won’t be a single usenet program left in their protfolio.
I guess they’re playing into the hands of Mozilla. Absolutely brilliant Mailtool & Newsreader. It’s pretty, it converts all your old mail, comes with a spam filter, and is all-around he most standard-compliant mailtool around. And unlike Outlook Express, it’s not going to go away.
Going through my recent email, people have been sending me mail using these mail tools:
– Outlook Express: 65 users
– Mozilla: 36 users
– GMX Web Interface: 22 users
– Outlook IMO: 19 users
– KMail: 11 users
– The Bat!: 11 users
– web.de Web Interface: 10 users
– Mutt: 9 users
– Outlook: 9 users
– Outlook CWS: 8 users
– Eudora: 6 users
– AOL: 6 users
– Yahoo: 5 users
– Ximian Evolution: 4 users
– Apple Mail: 3 users
– Forte: 2 users
– Opera: 2 users
– IMP: 5 users
– NOCC, T-Online, PocoMail, Ultrafunk, Juno, cityweb Bluewin: 1 user each