email

You and I may be RSS junkies, but plenty of Internet users are not. The masses still dig reading e-mail. And sending it: many small business owners are more comfortable blasting their customers with e-mail than they are updating a blog.

Feedblitz, an established blog-to-e-mail service provider, is rolling out new capabilities that serve both readers and authors who aren't comfortable with blogs and RSS feeds. Like Feedburner, Feedblitz can convert blogs to e-mail feeds. In fact, Feedburner offers Feedblitz-powered e-mails to its users. But Feedblitz on its own offers a lot more customization options, including a solution that … Read more

In addition to revealing the prices for iPhone data plans Tuesday, Apple also released another video showing how iPhone customers can activate their new phones from home.

With long lines expected outside Apple and AT&T stores on Friday, some analysts had expressed concern that the process of setting up an iPhone could turn into an all-night affair. But the companies are letting customers activate their iPhones over the Internet using iTunes. The video shows how plugging the iPhone into a Mac or PC steps the user through the signup process, which of course works flawlessly on the demo.… Read more

The fifth version of Motorola's Good Mobile Messaging software will be out later this year with improvements to how the software handles attachments, calendar appointments and deleting massive amounts of e-mail.

If you're not using a BlackBerry, your employer might be using Good Mobile Messaging to "push" your corporate e-mail to a mobile device. Good Technology developed the product before being acquired by Motorola last year, and this is the first major release since the acquisition.

Good 5.0 lets you group e-mails by conversation, deleting those threads from hell in one fell swoop. It lets … Read more

So, I know we all get on lists, and our names are stored in databases. It's annoying, but it's a fact of life.

But I was reminded of that Thursday in a particularly annoying way.

A friend of mine, who shall go unnamed, is a Vonage subscriber. Presumably, at one point in the past, she put my e-mail address on the company's Refer-A-Friend list. If I signed up, she would get something, maybe a month of free service or somesuch. I really don't remember if this had happened, but it's certainly possible.

What I do … Read more

Customers paying for AT&T and Yahoo's co-branded DSL service are outraged about ads that started showing up over the last few weeks that take up quite a bit of real estate on the page. A chunky "skyscraper" ad now runs up and down the right side of the page. There have always been ads on Yahoo's free Web-based e-mail service, but paying customers say the monthly fees they pay should be enough to spare them the advertising.

"AT&T Yahoo has inserted advertising into every corner and crevice of the AT&… Read more

According to the Associated Press, the US Defense Department took 1,500 computers offline as the result of a cyber attack. No additional information about the event was provided. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said the attack happened sometime yesterday and that e-mail systems were expected to be back online later today.

Gate said during a press conference on the matter: "We obviously have redundant systems in place. ... There will be some administrative disruptions and personal inconveniences." When asked if he, personally, had been inconvenienced, Gates replied that he's a very low tech person. "I don't … Read more

In this eighth installment of the Open Source CEO Series, I spoke with Satish Dharmaraj, CEO of Zimbra, the industry's leading open source email/collaboration software.

Satish is the rare CEO who whose intelligence dwarfs his ego. He has managed to build one of the most interesting and media-hyped startups in the software world, with a highly competent team (which includes Scott Dietzen, former CTO of BEA), and yet he remains humble and seems happy to let others on his team shine. You'd think that more CEOs share these qualities, but in my experience Satish is a rare find.

Name, position, and company of executive Satish Dharmaraj, CEO, Zimbra.… Read more

New stuff coming out in the White House email saga. When last we reported we had been told about 50 staffers used private e-mail service while at work. And we explained how hard it would be to truly delete any of those e-mails. Now the congressional investigators say at least 88 White House staff members used a private e-mail service provided by the Republican National Committee (RNC). So far Congress and the RNC have spent two months negotiating about access to those e-mails and even data about the e-mails.

Today's reports say adviser Karl Rove alone has more than 150,000 e-mails still on RNC servers. … Read more

Josh and I just spent the better part of two days finding e-mail contacts for the products that were nominated for the Webware 100 awards. Many nominations came from people not affiliated with the companies that made these products. Fans, in other words.

To these fans, I say, thanks for taking the time to nominate the products you like. But to nearly all companies that have the fans, I blow loud and wet raspberries in your general direction. Do you have any idea how freaking hard it was to find contact information for you?

In far too many cases, there … Read more