Microsoft to replace Windows Mail
Could the days of the desktop mail program be fading away? While enterprise-level businesses and customers still rely heavily on desktop PIM and email management programs like Outlook to handle their day to day operations, consumers are looking more and more to web-based methods to handle their email and scheduling duties. Google’s suite of applications, including GMail and Google Calendar have provided a useful alternative to Outlook/Apple Mail-based solutions for quite a while. Late to the game as usual has been Microsoft, who’s recently revamped Windows Live Hotmail moves the company closer to having an online experience that mirrors a software based solution. True to form, Microsoft has announced that it will be phasing out support for Outlook Express in XP, and the Windows Mail application in Vista. While Live Hotmail does have a desktop client, the web-based interface provides instant and universal access to your email, scheduling, and MSN messenger duties. Look for Windows Mail to disappear over the coming weeks as the Live Hotmail plane takes flight.
[Via PCworld.ca]
You got the story wrong. Or rather, PC World didn’t explain it well, and key details were left out of your summary.
Windows Mail and Outlook Express will be replaced with Windows Live Mail for Windows. That new program is a superset of Windows Mail. It adds a newer interface (more of a refinement of the existing Windows Mail).
Windows Live Mail will be just as open as Windows Mail, and actually builds on the list of standards Windows Mail already supports. The largest thing that it adds is Hotmail integration, prompting the name change to being a part of the Live-branch of Microsoft.
In other words, the sky is not falling, Microsoft is just replacing Windows Mail with Windows Live Mail, which is an enhanced version of Windows Mail.
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