Rich Webmail for Everyone

The largest non-facilities based ISP in North America rolls out a new webmail product that's nifty whether you're on dialup or broadband.

by Alex Goldman ISP-Planet Managing Editor [June 6, 2005]

Whereas many other large, public companies like to pretend they don't have dialup customers, Atlanta-based EarthLink is honest about its dialup subscriber numbers and continues to make sure that the applications it offers subscribers will work over dialup.

So when EarthLink decided to change dialup with its favorite rich media consultant company, San Mateo, Calif.-based Laszlo Systems (no relation to the Jupiter Research broadband analyst, Joe Laszlo), dialup users were a target audience.

EarthLink Enhanced Webmail, which will launch in early July, is a product that uses flash animation rather than dhtml for a simple reason: keeping customers satisfied. "Webmail is too slow," says John Foltz, EarthLink's product manager for e-mail. "Writing, viewing, each of these actions loads a new page. Our goal is to make it fast, and we do that in part by keeping it all to one page."

Animations are attractive, and the application responds quickly. Much happens in the background, however. "The user sees an action take place immediately, though the server transaction takes place in the background, like sending an e-mail message in a traditional e-mail client," says Foltz.

The key is to interact with users in real time. "We're closer to what the e-commerce sites are doing than our competitors," says Jerry Grasso, EarthLink director of corporate communications. "We will be light years ahead of our competitors when we roll this out."

When the user first logs on to webmail, an application is downloaded (size not disclosed). "The first time they load the application, it will take a few seconds," says Foltz.

But he says the time won't be wasted. "We'll play an animation about the product."

Features
The product runs on an impressive array of operating systems, including Windows 98 through XP, Mac OS 9 and 10, and even some versions of Red Hat and Solaris. Versions of IE, Netscape, Mozilla, Opera, Safari, AOL, and even CompuServe browsers are supported (but not FireFox).

In addition, the app:

• Checks for new mail in the background
• Uses auto suggest for e-mail addresses
• Has tool tips when the user's mouse hovers over any element of the interface
• Enables access from any computer on which the app is loaded

It all adds up to a brilliant idea. It's the kind of good idea that feels intuitive and obvious. It doesn't seem strange that this application is possible; it does seem strange that nobody's ever done it this way before.

— End