Why no choice with Google Compose?

Dear Google,

I have been using your reliable mail service for over five years now and always preferred it to other free services that I have tried in the past (except for the even better Zoho Mail). I understand that your staff, who almost certainly average around thirteen years of age, and desperately need to fill their work time with pointless and increasingly ridiculous 'improvements' to Google services in the name of progress, have recently endeavoured to 'improve' the compose function in GMail. As marvellous as change for change's sake is, and not wanting to sound like a Luddite in any way or form, it has come to my attention that the old normal style of composing an email is to be permanently replaced with the 'new' and fashionable style. Without wanting to sound old fashioned or feeling the need to remove my clogs and throw them anywhere, I have to question the fact that I now have no choice but to use this rather pointless 'improvement'. I know I am well over the age of thirteen and am even one of those foreign type chaps (we drive on the other side of the road) and are very probably what many Australians would term a 'whinging Pom'. However, I just cannot envisage what possible advantage there is to composing an email on an absurdly silly little pop-up window. Maybe if I actually was thirteen years old and only wanted to send messages in shorthand text-speak regularly mutilating the Queen's English it would be an improvement of sorts. Unfortunately I am not a teenager and often need to compose far more detailed emails. I know I can expand the size of the window, but does this additional function necessarily ameliorate or improve the overall emailing experience for people like myself who regularly need to send grown-up emails? I hate to sound ungrateful but surely having the choice permanently and letting me decide what is actually best for me would be the more mature option?


"Thanks for trying out the new compose"

Well, thank you for taking the time to invent a totally new way to send email that no other email provider uses to my knowledge. You must all be very proud of yourselves at Planet Google.

"The old compose will be going away soon."

Will it be taken to the email geriatric ward to wait peacefully for the big send button in the sky?

"If you couldn't find something that you were looking for, you may want to review all of the changes or revisit the brief tour."

I am now seriously considering purchasing a large polo mallet and heading towards Google headquarters.

Yours optionally deprived,

Daveski17

 

Wow this new compose is really bad.

I just opened outlook.com and gmail.com to compare some functions, so far outlook.com beats gmail.com in everything.

 

Thanks JR but I know how to temporarily revert to the old Compose. I just wish that Google would eventually leave it to individual choice. I had a feeling that they would force this new version. I don't see how complicating the compose mode is progress.

 

It's just overcomplicating something that was comparitively simple IMO.

I couldn't have predicted you would say that.

 

I didn't notice your post and posted, then got caught! lol
These companies are mad I tell you!
Now, on top of my hate of the new Yahoo, comes a new gmail format. No positive reason for it at all. I'm convinced they are just all having a "change" war. "There is nothing so constant as (worthless (my 2¢)) change," as some astute philosopher once said!

 

Is it really that surprising? Seems most things these days insist on change regardless of if the new version is any better than the old version.

Its always nice when the new is much better than the old, but often it makes you wonder just who it is that wants the new version of something when it is no better or worse than the old. (and that was a really long sentence, much better than the old shorter version... sentence v2.32 lol)

It would be interesting to see the demographics on a change such as this. I have a feeling the types that frequent a wilders environment don't fit into the demographic of the majority

Could be worse I guess. They could make it work only with a touch-screen lol.

I would find myself drawn, like a moth to flame, to products which advertised "still the same old thing, still working just like it used to".

Sul.

 

I suspect that the reason for the frequent changes is getting more media attention (that includes social media/blogs), and not user's comfort.

 

Me, too. I suppose the same. However, getting attention is may be just the worst marketing style and marketing type of ads!

Or may be Microsoft paid Google a solid amount of $ to make this change so that Outlook.com look better < >

By the way, seriously, I really can't stand all these changes that these companies make and just like ratchet and Daveski17 I think they are all MAD controlled by some teenagers who wonder how to spend their free time changing styles. Neither Google Mail is OK now, nor is Outlook.com (the first one with ugly colors, buttons an this NEW compose mail pop-up!) and the second one with so big fonts, big and ugly buttons - I hate them all at the moment.

Because of that I started using mail client at home on the home PC - to avoid looking at the ugly web interfaces - I never did that before at home.

 

I actually like the big fonts and big buttons. Outlook.com looks much cleaner, logical and intuitive than Gmail.

 

As the title of the thread says is -> Why no choice !? This is The Problem.

Why the users are forced to use something they do not like - why don't they have some choice - being it the web interface, the OS interface, etc. We are being forced to do something we do not like to do.

 

"An overload of options, researchers say, may actually push people into decisions that are against their own best interest."

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/27/your-money/27shortcuts.html?_r=0

lol

"Research also shows that an excess of choices often leads us to be less, not more, satisfied once we actually decide. There’s often that nagging feeling we could have done better."

 

I'm actually going to write an article on this soon.
Mrk

 

I've seen the new Yahoo! page, although the UK & Ireland one hadn't changed to the terrible new one the last time I looked. I agree with you though, it isn't an improvement. On the other hand my customised 'My Yahoo!' page hasn't changed for years.

Yeah, as I've said before, it's all just pointless marketing. Pointless & redundant change is I suppose the new mantra of the post Generation X teenage software designers who seem to collectively have the attention span of a lobotomised goldfish & naively presume that anyone who has actually survived puberty is too decrepit & mentally deficient to make their own choices in life. Perhaps if they did a bit more research, or even left their mother's basements once in a while, they may even realise that a great many people over the age of twenty one are not actually senile & don't spend their waking hours vacantly staring at laptop screens dribbling onto their respective trackpads.

 

Your fanboi obsessions aside, it seems to me that Outlook looks like it was designed by attention deficient seven year olds with a sugar deficiency who have been playing with soggy construction paper on a rainy day in a car park. GMail was the last bastion of a sensible mail service until this. Outlook is just more dumbed down than 'intuitive'. The plain fact of the matter is that I expect this balderdash & immature nonsense from Microsoft but I was surprised that Google have implemented these redundant & quite frankly egregiously preposterous policies.

 

You just couldn't make this stuff up! I suppose these 'researchers' have some bizarre theory about 'choice anxiety' or something LOL!

 

Exactly, it seems to be a rather patronising attitude by software designers to me. There was nothing wrong with the original 'Compose' & if the delinquent hyperactive nerds feel the need to 'redesignificate' & 'improvify' the 'customer interfaceial email composification experience' why can't the geek-speaking anoraks who design this nonsense at least give the user a choice in the matter?

 

I recommend Zoho Mail, once you have set up a free account you can access it with your GMail password & even access Google Docs. Zoho is simple & clean. It isn't horrifically ugly & dumbed down like Outlook & yet is as functional as GMail. I dislike the puerile & aesthetically retarded Outlook so much that I actually use Windows Live Messenger now if I want to send mail in MS.

 

Shhhh .... don't give them any ideas!

I think that this is the appeal of SeaMonkey, it's still considered a heresy to have individual tabs with buttons on to close them. To this day SM 'out of the box' doesn't have individual tab closing buttons.

 

If it works - change it. Old IBM philosophy IMHO.
These people have to do something to justify all the goodies supplied
by the Google office. And we have to suffer for it........

Tell me more about Zoho mail. How much does it cost?
Can I transfer all my stuff to it and what will I lose?
How hard is it to backup the email addresses?
Will it allow multiple identities?
Can I run Gmail and Zoho for a short test period?
How stable is it?
Is the company that created a fly by night outfit?
All I can think at present.

 

Try it yourself, I just use the free version. Look for 'Free Personal Account - Sign up here to get yourself a free usernamezoho.com email account.' at the bottom of this Zoho page.

 

Hi Daveski17,
I tried signing up with the Lite version and can't get past the Domain thingy.
Myusernamezoho.com is flagged as invalid.
I, to my knowledge, don't have a domain name.
I have a web site but I don't think that is the same thing.
Thanks for any help.

 

It's not the Lite version you want as a personal user. Click here to the log in/register page:

 

Go for it Mrk!

Thing is will it change Google's approach

They don't care they are making $ and are on a power trip.

I hope they trip...

 

Hi Daveski17,
Progress report.
Got it downloaded and running. Was able to import my contacts from Gmail
with no problems. Was able to send and receive an emails.
Did some reading in the manual about "MX" and was thoroughly confused.
BUT, I don't need to worry about this - right.

Next thing would be how to import all my emails from Gmail.