OK, this is one of the many in one post. My friend Hitesh posted an invitation in Orkut Gujarati community for an invitation to Gmail and quite a few people replied and thus started an conversation on what Gmail is and few other things.
1) My friends at Orkut say that Gmail is making Fuss
here is what I say:-”Google is not creating a big fuss about it, but actually people who are using it and loving and hating it are creating a big fuss.
Also, people who don't have Gmail are creating a big fuss. Good marketing tactics by Google, because, when people don't have something readily available they talk more about it. For example, did you see many many people talking about Yahoo 100 MB offer and Rediffmail 1 GB offer?”
2) Amit is not impressed with Gmail and rather stick with Yahoo and Hotmail
“Amit:- Would love to hear from you what you did like and did'nt like? Incase you are interested, there are heaps of tools that are built around Gmail through which you can use Gmail as a POP3 email, forward your hotmail email to Gmail and few more.”
3) My friend Raj says, he sold Gmail invitation for $US 25 and he is happy about it and he was surprised when I said I give it out for free
here is what I said”And Raj, what you said sounds like a good deal. And yes I am serious, Gmail email was sold at $US 0.11.
I have seen people swapping Gmail invitation and coming with all sorts of innovative idea. I myself get atleast 4-6 requests on my blog for Gmail invitations and atleast 10 requests a day for Orkut invitation. I did a experiment few days back on what are people's reaction when you want to sell Gmail invitation publicly and below in the link to my blog, you will find my results.
http://geekswithblogs.net/tpatel/archive/2004/06/11/6474.aspx
Yes, I am one of the person among thousands of other people who are giving away Gmail for free and I have some good reasons for it.
Firstly when I give out Gmail invites to people that I know allready, i.e. my friends, I am sharing something that I have and enjoying it. It makes me happy and it makes them happy as well. When I share my Gmail invites to other people I don't know or would like to know, I am inviting them to be my friends. Those friends can be in any part of the world and this MIGHT be a friendship for the rest of my lifetime. I get to connect and network with more people and in a way I get to know humans and myself in a better way. I get to see the world through their eyes which is valued more than $25-$100!
Some of my such friends that I have found on Orkut and invited them to Gmail are Kurang Shah, Prateek Shah (All Shah's ahyee) and recently I invited Murtuza Pitolwala as well.
Then I send invites to people who influence the market, whose voice has a power to influence what others do or think.
And in doing all of the above, it did not cost me anything but will give me a long term return in terms of friends, relation, knowledge, thinking power and a lot. Looks like I am in a win win situation after all”
Tejas Patel