A major upgrade to Gmail is getting the thumbs down from users who complain that the new version is extremely slow, often fails to load pages and even crashes their browsers.
People have flooded discussion forums with complaints since Google began “upgrading” users about two weeks ago to the new version, popularly referred to in the blogosphere as Gmail 2.0.
Ironically, Gmail 2.0, which features an upgraded contacts manager, is designed to be faster and more stable. Gmail 2.0 is based on what a Google spokesman calls “a major structural code change” upon which new features will be launched in coming months.
“Most users should see a marked improvement in performance. We recommend using IE7 and Firefox 2 to take full advantage of Gmail’s speedier interface,” said spokesman Jason Freidenfelds via e-mail.
Asked about the problems users are reporting, Freidenfelds didn’t address the complaints specifically but said that Google appreciates the feedback it’s getting. “The new code underlying Gmail should allow us to roll out performance improvements more frequently,” he said.
Users interviewed via e-mail for this article report a variety of performance problems with Gmail 2.0.
The most common complaint is that it is generally very slow, with delays of a minute or more when attempting to display the inbox upon logging on, to record keystrokes when typing text and to respond to mouse clicks. Often the tasks time out. Others report that Gmail 2.0 repeatedly crashes or freezes their browsers, in particular Firefox.
If these users switch to the “old” Gmail version, the problems go away. However, these users say they have to switch manually every time they log on, because Gmail 2.0 automatically became their default version once they got upgraded to it.
When Google upgraded his account last week, Jim Sellers, a software programmer based in Ottawa, Canada, was eager to try Gmail 2.0′s improved contacts manager, but his Firefox 2.0 browser kept crashing both on Windows 2000 and Mac OS X 10.4.
“These problems were very disruptive. I spend at least 25 percent of my day using my browser as one of my main working tools. To have it crash like that made the new version of Gmail a non-option,” said Sellers, an otherwise satisfied Gmail user since June 2004.
As a workaround, Sellers has bookmarked the URL for the “old” Gmail version. However, others expressed worry that Google at some point will phase out access to the “old” Gmail without having fully resolved problems.
Some users interviewed also complained that Google didn’t notify them that they would be moved to Gmail 2.0, or give them an option to decline the upgrade.
Others, on the other hand, trust Google will soon solve the issues. That’s the case of Jack Freeman, a retiree in Oklahoma who, for lack of broadband options in his area, has learned to live with, and make the best of, his relatively slow dial-up connection.
For example, he enjoys posting answers in Google discussion forums, and in recent days has been addressing a lot of questions about the slowness of Gmail 2.0. Freeman’s solution to the delays has been to toggle between the two versions of the service. “It is still my favorite e-mail program,” Freeman said.
Google is moving people progressively to Gmail 2.0, so some users have it and others don’t.
Google didn’t immediately reply to a series of follow-up questions, so it’s not clear what percentage of people have access to the new version and how many are experiencing problems with it. It’s also unclear when Google expects to have everyone on the new version and when the performance problems be solved.
What’s clear is that the problems have unleashed a storm of complaints. A search, sorted by date, for “Gmail slow” in the Gmail Help Discussion forum returns about 35 pages of results related to problems with Gmail 2.0.
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How do you win in the search engine wars? Two approaches suggest themselves: 1) build a better search engine or 2) bribe users. Microsoft is trying option two in hopes of gathering enough data to make option one a reality.
Microsoft sent out an e-mail to Hotmail users this week, asking them to participate in the “Live Search Trial Program.” The program rewards users with “tickets” every time they use Live Search to find something, which can then be redeemed for prizes later on. These prizes include everything from t-shirts to video games, and the promo will extend through February of next year.
The promotion isn’t just to bring in new users, but also to help Microsoft test things out and get feedback. The prizes will ultimately help the company improve the search experience, a Microsoft spokesperson told MarketWatch, which in turn will “improve our understanding of the types of searches users perform each day and the search engines they utilize.”
Microsoft revamped its Live Search in late September, quadrupling its index size. The company also made a number of tweaks to the the search engine’s query algorithms, results page, and the way it analyzes clickstream data. The changes were significant and welcome to regular users, but didn’t offer much that was innovative when compared to the competition. If anything, they brought Live Search more in line with features that were already offered by search giant Google.
The promotion suggests that Microsoft is still in search of a sizable user base from which to get feedback data. This is also not the first time Microsoft has tried such a promotion. When it launched a similar effort earlier this year, the company managed to increase its share of the search market to 13.3 percent, according to Nielsen numbers. It has since dipped again in recent months, however, and continues to place a distant third after Yahoo and Google.
Prizes may help in increasing small levels of market share, but Microsoft won’t be able to overtake the big dogs unless it launches something truly unique that will be able to set Live Search apart from the rest.
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The only real thing that the iPhone and the Gphone have in common at the moment are five letters.
Google’s plans for the mobile phone market have caused quite the stir Monday, even though the company’s press conference Monday morning didn’t add much to what we already knew about Android, a collection of software that could be a catalyst for Linux on mobile phones over the next few years. Still, when any company the size of Google makes noise about steering its ship in a certain direction, people take notice.
One nice development is that we can stop calling the damn thing the Gphone, which stopped being cute awhile ago in the fine tradition of J-Lo, A-Rod, and K-Fed. But while both Apple and Google will be selling mobile phone software in late 2008, the companies seem determined to walk a fine line in their new dual relationship as trusted partner and wary competitor.
Android is a nice idea; take the promise of Linux as a mobile operating system and finally give it a backer with some legs. This could set Google up nicely for the future if mobile phones continue to turn into little computers, since companies like Symbian and Microsoft are far from entrenched in this market.
Apple is also eying that future. Much of what Google said about Android during its press conference–such as the desire for a better Internet experience on mobile phones–was uttered by Apple CEO Steve Jobs in January during the presentation of the iPhone. And it’s already sold 1.4 million iPhones in three months.
So this time next year, are we going to be talking about the looming showdown between Google and Apple in mobile computing, or the surprising resignation of Google’s Eric Schmidt from Apple’s board of directors?
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Posted in Apple, Google, Hardware, Ideas, Linux | 1 Comment »
