With it being April Fools Day today, the announcement of Google's Gmail service may be either
one of the best things to hit the Web in a long time, or one of the biggest Internet hoaxes in recent memory.
If you read the press release, several things stand out which may make it seem to be a Google joke.
Amidst rampant media speculation, Google Inc. today announced it is testing a preview release of Gmail – a free search-based webmail service with a storage capacity of up to eight billion bits of information, the equivalent of 500,000 pages of email. Per user.
The first paragraph is definitely not written in a traditional PR style. "Admist rampant media speculation" and "up to eight billion bits of information" are two examples of this.
The idea that there could be a better way to handle email caught the attention of a Google engineer who thought it might be a good "20 percent time" project. (Google requires engineers to spend a day a week on projects that interest them, unrelated to their day jobs). Millions of M&Ms later, Gmail was born.
This third paragraph, while funny, would seem untypical because most press releases usually, again, don't have this type of casual writing style.
Storage: Google believes people should be able to hold onto their mail forever. That's why Gmail comes with 1,000 megabytes (1 gigabyte) of free storage – more than 100 times what most other free webmail services offer.
1 gigabyte of storage seems like way over the top for a free web based service, especially when you consider the number of users a Google-email system would see. The cost basis maybe too huge, even with the new email ad system they are planning to implement.
Reasons it might not be a big hoax include (1) it would make no sense for a company which may be going public to make such a huge joke like this and (2) Google, well known for their April Fools jokes, might actually be playing a different one by trying to make people believe this is a joke when in actuality it isn't.
I personally hope it isn't because I would love a gig of storage…
1. If this was an April fools joke it is going to damage the Google brand. Not funny to offer people something like 1gig of free email and then pull the rug out from under them. I for one would be very upset if this was a hoax.
Also, if it was a hoax why would they build a website for this?
Why would they risk upsetting investors before going public? I mean this service could drive 20-50% of Google's revenue in the future... if they were making this up they could look like idiots to Wall Street. Would you risk a $20b IPO on a joke?!?!
Posted at 4:40AM on Dec 19th 2005 by Jason McCabe Calacanis