Monday, September 05, 2005

Microsoft Mail Beta - Microsoft's brand new web mail service

Microsoft Mail Beta is Microsoft's brand new web mail service. The product is being built from the ground up based on input and feedback from customers. Microsoft is inviting people from the MSN Messenger beta to join the beta of their brand new web mail service. Testers will be part of the first group outside of the product team to experience the Mail Beta.

A hotmail account is required and is moved over to the new beta automatically. It includes 2GB of space, includes a rich text editor, protection from "phishing" scams and a new easier layout.



Reading Pane
Cruise through your e-mail with ease, as you go from mail to mail without loading a new page. The Reading Pane lets you preview the text and thumbnails of attached images in your Inbox. Just click the message to display the full content of the e-mail.

Safety made easy with the Info Barback to top
The Info Bar tells you when the Mail Beta doesn't recognize a sender, allowing you to block the sender with a single click, and bounce back an e-mail to help prevent a junk mailer from knowing you exist.

The Mail Beta also protects you from criminals trying to obtain ("phish") your personal information by hiding an e-mail's content when it suspects the sender may be fraudulent.

Address AutoComplete
When you start typing the name of a contact in the address field, Address AutoComplete offers suggestions of matching names from your contact list.

Simply select the correct address—no need to memorize addresses or look through your address book.

Keyboard shortcuts
Mail Beta allows you navigate the way you prefer—via your keyboard, mouse, or a combination of the two.

These keyboard shortcuts let you easily and quickly navigate through messages and folders. Mail Beta also enables multiple select via a combination of your keyboard's arrows or mouse and the shift key.

Many more keyboard shortcuts to come!

Rich text editing
Say what you want to say, the way you want to say it!

Rich Text Editing lets you add color, shading, and emoticons, control font size, and define formatting. Best of all, Mail Beta preserves all HTML formatting in the e-mails you receive so you can forward emails and know others will see them the way you do.

Storage that grows with you
We're starting you with 2GB (2 gigabytes) of storage so you can save more e-mail, more photos, more attachments, more of everything. Over time we plan to develop a system that will grow as you need more space.

(2 gigabytes=2,000,000,000 bytes)

Save sent e-mail
No need to cc: yourself on every outgoing e-mail. All the e-mail you send will now be saved in a "sent e-mail" folder—automatically