Feb 19, 2013
Microsoft announced today that its Outlook.com browser-based e-mail service has moved out of its preview stage and that Hotmail users who don’t switch over on their own will be upgraded gradually to the new product, automatically, starting this week. Luckily, users can keep their “@Hotmail” address in that transition, and they have the option to claim an “@Outlook.com” alias, as well. Supposedly the full phaseout of Hotmail will complete by summer.
If you have not studied the new product or don’t use it yet, here is a link to an article about Outlook.com: http://hothardware.com/News/The-New-Microsoft-Outlookcom-is-not-Your-Fathers-Outlook/
As I have mentioned before, Outlook.com is not a feature-matching web version of Outlook. Microsoft just borrowed the Outlook brand name; but it doesn’t look anything like the Outlook application (OWA is the closest web experience you can get to that).
Rather, Outlook.com is Microsoft’s push to modernize Hotmail, and its attempt to compete with Gmail and other free web mail services. To that end, here is a Microsoft “comparison” of Outlook.com to Gmail and Yahoo: http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/outlook-com/compare/ Granted, that comparo is highly biased, but it does point out significant potential advantages if you use free web mail a lot.
Michael Linenberger
One reader wrote this in to me:
“Referring to your article: “Outlook.com is Phasing Out Hotmail” To be accurate – Outlook.com DOES have contacts – and you can setup your Outlook.com in your Outlook2013 as an ExchangeActiveSync acct – with sync’d contacts and mail folders. I imagine that this service might improve over time if there is sufficient demand from users.”
Switching from Hotmail to Outlook was seamless for me and the modern interface is a refreshing change. The comparison link helped me see the potential advantages over Gmail and Yahoo. Excited about the upgrade.
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