Talk:Hotmail

Condensing work detailed

• I removed separately named features from TOC list and listed them in bulleted lists.
• reordered features in terms of priority of what a user is likely to see first in terms of actions s/he will do:
  • [login:] UI/localisation, search, color schemes
  • [various UI improvements to reading messages and taking actions:] Reading pane, keyboard shortcuts
  • [composing messages:] contact updates, address auto-complete image attachments, rich text editing, inline spell checking,
  • [other stuff:] storage
• I still left the safety section alone, because users need to know what's in store for them.

-BStarky 22:01, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Multiple Users Access

With the new security features, could Hotmail be accessed by multiple users from different locations at the same time with both of them being logged on? --Atreusk 23:10, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

For some reason, yes

kashimjamed (talk) 16:14, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

I can't see screenshot of Windows Live Hotmail

I don't know why I can't see it here, that's the reason why I replaced it with another screenshot I uploaded last month. I'm from Vietnam and I tried IE7 and Firefox2.0, but it stills don't show. I downloaded, clicked to go to Image page --> the same. Vinhtantran 09:38, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

Version

Is this really version 2.0?Geoffreynham 15:01, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Data Retention

I am aware that hotmail stores user information about people when they initially set up an account. Data such as IP address used to register etc. Does anyone know any details about microsoft/hotmail data retention? eg: period of time stored & what is stored?

mail deleted

They have forced an "upgrade" from hotmail, to something that seems unusable on dialup. And they have deleted all my email. All ten years of saved email. The article is wrong; they do not keep free email for 120 days. What is the actual period of time? It is besides the point to say they let you have 2GB or 5GB free, when they won't even let you keep a few megabytes, and you don't know how often you have to check your email to keep them from deleting it all. -69.87.200.139 13:15, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

It's a 120 day timeout (according to "Windows Weekly 25: Vista - Hot or Not?") -- Imperator3733 21:13, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

60 days if it's an old account, according to an email direct from MS customer support to me today: "If you are wondering why your MSN Hotmail account was migrated to Windows Live Hotmail and your account appears to be newly created, then the contents of your MSN Hotmail inbox were deleted by an automated service which flags accounts which have not been signed into for 60 or more days. Once the inbox contents have been deleted, they cannot be recovered.So if you are thinking of getting an MSN Hotmail account, then please note this key fact.

When you signed in after that period of inactivity, you were also upgraded to Windows Live Hotmail. Windows Live Hotmail will keep your account active, even if you do not sign in for 120 days." 87.81.12.15 (talk) 15:21, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

Accusation of Blatant advertising

As far as I can see, the information on this article is stating FACTS about Hotmail and not promoting it as such. I fail to see how much more neutral it can get, both unique features distinguishing it from other webmail services AND criticisms of Hotmail are included. I think a comparison needs to be done between this article and the Gmail article, and see if the style of writing about facts differs in any way, which I cannot see it does. My instinct tells me that this article has been bombarded with Advertisement templates by a sad Gmail fan, intent on belittling any competitor of Google's services with his own biased views. --Joowwww 12:23, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

I agree with the above. Having read the article, all I can say is that the article may require some cleanups and move the "miscellaneous" section into relevant sections. However, it definitely does not contain "blatant advertising" and hence should not be even considered for speedy deletion. The article states facts about the service and also its criticisms. Also, is it really needed to have THREE tags for speedy deletion on one article? --Pikablu0530 12:42, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

The "Features" section definitely reeked of blatant advertising. I've reworded several parts of the section to remove advertising lingo. I've also removed the POV, Cleanup and Advert templates from the article. -/- Warren 00:04, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

"The "Features" section definitely reeked of blatant advertising" I just read it, and I thought the same thing. The criticism section seems to have many minor, seemingly personal gripes that really don't seem notable to mention. Many webmail services have their flaws, is it mandatory that we list a criticism section? I haven't read any of the other webmail articles but I'll check them out too.Cannedbeef (talk) 20:54, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

• I have noted that this seems particlarly true in how someone snuck in an 'advertisement' about Gmail in here. This article is NOT "a history of the webmail services"- it is entitled "hotmail". The focus should be on Hotmail and how other varius services may have affected its development- so when someone says "Gmail was made with..." and lists all Gmails awesome, incredible features "innovation" and such with a link to the gmail section it sounds like either an advertisement for Gmail, or a "history of web email servces" with a bias to gmail. I think that portion should focus on hotmail, saying at most how gmail's entering onto the scene inspired *insert changes* in Hotmail... not listing gmails many, l33t features. I've become a little annoyed with how many wikipedia pages seemed to be used as an advertisement medium (carefully fit into the boundaries of what is allowed, sometimes even otside those)... so it is particularly annoying when that same thing is done for completely different companies' article. Coroloro (talk) 13:28, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

Live.com addresses

Does anyone know if the live.com email addresses are available yet? == Imperator3733 20:24, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

Yes, they are now available[1] WasAPasserBy 00:59, 15 November 2007 (UTC)

Requested move

The following discussion is an archived discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the proposal was move --Lox (t,c) 10:01, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

---

Windows Live Hotmail → Hotmail — This is a clear case WP:NC with regard commonly used names. A search for "Windows Live Hotmail" returns 1,040,000 results, while a search for "hotmail", excluding the phrase "Windows Live Hotmail" returns 371,000,000. That means that there are about three hundred and seventy million more results for "Hotmail", so it is probably safe to say that it is the most common name and should be used as the title. —GW_Simulations_{User Page | Talk} 20:58, 26 December 2007 (UTC)

Survey

Feel free to state your position on the renaming proposal by beginning a new line in this section with *'''Support''' or *'''Oppose''', then sign your comment with ~~~~. Since polling is not a substitute for discussion, please explain your reasons, taking into account Wikipedia's naming conventions.

• Support. The article covers Hotmail, MSN Hotmail, and Windows Live Hotmail. Article should not be renamed every time Hotmail is renamed, as it is still most commonly referred to by that name. –Pomte 15:05, 27 December 2007 (UTC)
• Support of course. And the person who changed the name should be given the Casino Royale treatment. SilkTork *^SilkyTalk 15:55, 27 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment: Initially, the "Windows Live Hotmail" we have now was named "Windows Live Mail", and it was a completely seperate thing from the then "MSN Hotmail". If they retained that name and made it final, I don't think people would still call it "Hotmail" as often as now. When they renamed it from "Windows Live Mail" to "Windows Live Hotmail", the article name changed as well. At that time, I recall that "Windows Live Hotmail" was still in its beta testing stages, and "MSN Hotmail" was still the mainstream service and hence they existed as separate articles. After "Windows Live Hotmail" replaced "MSN Hotmail" when it was released, the two articles were merged into what we have now, but no one remembered to renamed the article. --Pikablu0530 (talk) 22:29, 27 December 2007 (UTC)
• Support Now it's all the same thing there's no need for the pedanticism --Joowwww (talk) 17:35, 27 December 2007 (UTC)
• Support no doubt everyone in the world still calls it Hotmail.--Pikablu0530 (talk) 22:29, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Discussion

Any additional comments:

Comment on Google search results. Search on "Windows Live Hotmail" ENGLISH pages returns 355,000 results. Search on "Hotmail" without "Windows Live Hotmail" ENGLISH pages returns 18,600,000 results. These results doesn't not contradict what GW_Simulations said, but this is to make the results more convincing according to WP:NC where only English pages should be searched.--Pikablu0530 (talk) 22:38, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

• PAGE MOVED per discussion; cheers. -GTBacchus^(talk) 18:54, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

verifying spam addresses

The article contains the following line: "With virtually no exceptions, these addresses are used for the express purpose of verifying the recipient's address, thus opening the door for more spam."

This is what is generally assumed, but I have yet to see anyone substantiating that claim.

I even recall an article from years ago, where there was an experiment with fresh email addresses where the surprising outcome was that replying to opt-out links had no negative effect on the amount of spam received. Though considering that the benefits of having a few email addresses verified probably does not outweigh the work involved in setting up a system for that purpose, perhaps this shouldn't really come as such a surprise.

I don't recall the scale of that experiment, and whether things have changed since then, but I think the claim made in the article does warrant some reference to some external source. One which isn't just repeating "common knowledge". — SvdB (talk) 00:12, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

missed DNS renewals

I cleaned up the section on missed renewals and combined the two paragraphs for brevity. The hotmail.co.uk section had the wrong year anyway (it happened in 2003 according to the reference), and it was passport.com that wasn't renewed in 1999. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Belwig (talk • contribs) 02:47, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Quoting

How on earth do you quote part of all of an e-mail when responding to it? I tried it on a Mac and also on a PC, and it doesn't seem to let me do it. What an incredible pain! If someone knows how to do it, (a) please tell me; and (b) let's definitely incorporate the answer in this article. Thanks, EverybodyLovesSomebody (talk) 00:30, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

Ease of use? (criticism)

I'm not sure, but my friends and I have found Windows Live Hotmail to be very user unfriendly. It took me 30 minutes to find out how to change my password, and when I did, Hotmail barraged me with warnings about "unsecure connections" even though Firefox says that it is safe/secure. --Kelvin_HO^{Wiknerd(talk)} 11:41, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Well there is a handy little help button on the Hotmail interface, it's there and it's usable. It also has information on how to change your password. I don't think the trouble of changing your password applies to Hotmail specifically, seeing as your account is used across multiple services. You change your password outside of Hotmail anyway, so it's not Hotmail's problem. Also, I'm on Firefox and have never had a problem with Hotmail and it's "unsecure connections" so it must be a problem down your end mate. Swanny92 (talk) 12:18, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

POP3 Access

The acticle says that "POP3 access, although not directly available through Hotmail, can be accessed via Windows Live Mail, and Microsoft Outlook with Outlook Connector.[4]" Firstly, WLM and Outlook do not give you POP3 access, they are simply desktop applications that access Hotmail via proprietary means.

Secondly "Hotmail Plus" subscribers do get real POP3 (and SMTP) access, see [[2]]. -- Mallardtheduck (talk) 08:14, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing that out. That was a major mistake. Users often confuse POP3 and WebDAV, so whoever added it probably meant WebDAV. -- xpclient ^talk 16:04, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

Javascript problems

I have noticed in the past week that Winows Live Hotmail has added javascript for opening personal emails. I can't *right-click* and open a new window no more. And secondly the past few days I can't even open my emails, it won't do anything.

I hope I'm not the only person having this problem. So I'm leaving this here just incase. Maybe it will force Microsoft to clean their mess up. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.198.128.243 (talk) 06:09, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Redirect

When a site redirects to somewhere else do not restore the redirect. Thanks, SqueakBox 15:07, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

The problem with putting the full URl there is its extremely fragile. If hotmail decide to make even the slightest change to their URL format it will become a deadlink, whereas hotmail.com is always going to work. The reason they put a redirect there is so they can change the internal formatting of their URLs without breaking inbound links. Linking to hotmail.com makes more sense. Gwernol 15:29, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

I have removed the link as they are clearly not going top restore it. Using a redirect makes us look sloppy and unprofessional, as if we had not noticed, it also gives the reader the wrong idea that hotmail.com still exists as a webpage. Thanks, SqueakBox 15:36, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

The Hotmail.com is used for a reason. A) It's considered the one of the "official" links to Hotmail (like mail.live.com was and now hotmail.live.com, which all also redirect) and B) like Gwernol said, putting the full URI there is fragile as they could change it any minute and it would most likely become a dead link. I don't know anybody who would sit at their computer typing in "login.live.com/... whatever" just to avoid using a redirect and saving yourself about 2 seconds of loading. If this was another webpage we were talking about then yes in that case we would use the full link rather than a redirect though "www.hotmail.com" is used for a reason. Swanny92 (talk) 00:59, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Inclusion of Competetors

Regarding this section in the development description of hotmail: "After a period of technological stagnation, the webmail industry received a significant boost in 2004 when the Google search engine announced its own mail service, Gmail. Featuring increased storage space, speed and interface flexibility, this new competitor spurred a wave of innovation in webmail. The main industry heavyweights – Hotmail and Yahoo! Mail – introduced upgraded versions of their e-mail services with greater speed, security and advanced features."

Is it necessary, in an accurate description of hotmails growth, to describe Gmail's virtues and mention Yahoo alongside hotmail? How does this keep the article focused on the topic and retain neutrality? Elaborate and discuss.Coroloro (talk) 13:10, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

Inaccurate Information

The Registration section says that users are offered a choice of hotmail.com hotmail.co.uk etc. This is not true. If, for example, you are in the uk, you are *only* offered a choice of uk addresses, i.e. hotmail.co.uk or live.co.uk.

So-called criticisms section

I noticed that just about everything in the "Criticisms" section has nothing to do with criticism. I'm going to split that content into other sections, and it seems like it would be easy to integrate the information on actual criticism into other sections as well, as suggested by Wikipedia:Criticism. Anyone disagree? - Josh (talk | contribs) 05:00, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

This is the lightest criticism I've ever seen of any of the numerous insecure M$ products. How easy is it to hack into a known person's account or even hack right past all of M$ security since they just refuse to fix known issues in their server/firewall that manages hotmail.com/live.com like this "critical vulnerability in SQL Server" that has known "for more than eight months"

http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&taxonomyName=Business+Intelligence&articleId=9124351&taxonomyId=9&pageNumber=1

There isn't even a listing of the type of servers they use. (don't know, but my money is on SQL Server) Do you guys all work for M$ or do they send you gold once a month? ;) The Unknown Soldier(talk | contribs) 12:40, 2 Jan 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.57.15.197 (talk)

Link to hotmail or windows live mail?

Hi all, Many wikipedias have articles about both Windows Live Mail and Hotmail. My bot tried to get things straight today, but got reverted. What would be the best to link to from here with interwiki links? Any bright ideas? Thijs! (talk) 17:08, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Hotmail should only link to pages that are named "Hotmail" or "Windows Live Hotmail" (the two official names).

Windows Live Mail (a separate software program) should be linked only to "Windows Live Mail".

Of course, there are names for the respective titles above in different languages, such as Arabic, and these should also be retained.

I believe that in most wikipedias, the articles are named either "Hotmail" or "Windows Live Hotmail" in English already as this is the brand name. And I'd say most of the ones that are not in English titles (such as the Arabic page identified above) are already properly interwiki linked. So I don't think your bot needs to do anything for the moment Thijs!. --Pikablu0530 (talk) 06:34, 29 August 2008 (UTC)

Browser compatibility

It says that since Nov 4 2008 Google Chrome works with Hotmail - but I use Chrome and only get a read only mode when I log in - it won't let me write. Microsoft is obviously doing this intentionally and it has not been corrected. Is this happening to others? Because if it is then the statement should be removed. Malick78 (talk) 10:47, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

Very restricted

I can't even send a compressed folder because it's "too large"! How many MBs is their limit? --Crackthewhip775 (talk) 23:54, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

I have been a user since april 4th 1997 and back then they used allow these type of things but since ms took over alot of neat features vanished. 75.2.6.86 (talk) —Preceding undated comment was added at 22:31, 16 January 2009 (UTC).

Discussion for splitting into MSN Hotmail and Windows Live Hotmail

• Oppose To whoever suggested the split, please note that it was after a really long debate to come to the consensus and settle with the decision to merge Windows Live Hotmail and MSN Hotmail articles together, and renaming the article to Hotmail as it is today. The person who placed the split template did not provide any reason for doing so. If the reasoning behind the split was based on article size, this article's length is not long enough to justify a split. Therefore I strongly oppose to splitting the article. --Pikablu0530 (talk) 05:36, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

Discussion for merging Windows Live Web Messenger into Hotmail

• Postpone It is unknown at this stage whether Windows Live Web Messenger will have its own independent service as well as integrating into the new version Hotmail. I'd suggest postponing the merge at least until it is officially integrated into Hotmail. Please take note that currently, the Windows Live Web Messenger article contains information (particularly historical information) about both MSN Web Messenger and the once independent service Windows Live Web Messenger that was released to beta testers only. These are particularly important information that should be preserved even when merged. --Pikablu0530 (talk) 05:45, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

• Postpone Still unknown...even though it has already been redirected...The supposed reference at liveside.net only states that the Web Messenger has gone into preliminary dogfood testing withing Microsoft only, and has not been released either in full or to the general public.WasAPasserBy (talk) 07:06, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

I log onto hotmail.com and after a few minutes it shuts me out

We at our house, log onto our own account, then sign in for our name and go to look at our mail and then it boots me out and I have to log on all over again.Why? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.209.249.13 (talk) 04:01, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

Stop changimg my hotmail!!! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.167.121.57 (talk) 22:05, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

Phone number

One issue is P.O.C. I have recently encountered a situation in which I needed to contact customer service for hotmail, and was wondering if it might be a good thing to include a P.O.C. section in the article.John5Russell3Finley (talk) 03:50, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

I NEED HELP GETTING INTO MY EMAIL WHIT HOTMAIL. IT SAY THEY WILL SEND ME MY PASSWORD VIA EMAIL BUT I CAN NOT GET INTO IT SO HOW WILL THAT HELP ME. I DID NOT HAVE PROBLEMS WITH MY PASSWORD I TRIED TO GET ON MY EMAIL AT SOMEONE ELSE HOME AND HAD PROBLEMS THERE AND WHEN I GOT ON MY OWN COMPUTER THE PROBLEM WAS THERE ALSO. I HAVE ANOTHER EMAIL BUT ALL MY ADDRESS ARE IN MY MSN HOTMAIL ACCOUNT MY EMAIL ACCOUNT IS GJEUBANKS@MSN.COM MY OTHER ACCOUNT IS GLOEUB@AOL.COM IF YOU COULD HELP ME WITH THIS IT WOULD BE NICE OF YOU THANKS GLORIA EUBANKS YOU CAN SEND ME SOME QUESTIONS TO MY OTHER ACCOUNT AND I WILL ANSWER THEM THE BEST THAT I CAN. I HAVE MOVED THREE TIMES SO I MAY NOT BE ABLE TO REMEMBER ALL OF THEM IF MY QUESTIONS WERE ANSWERED IN 2002 THEN I WOULD BE ABLE TO ANSWER THEM BUT I JUST BOUGHT THIS COMPUTER AND I GAVE MY NEW ADDRESS FROM THE PAST TWO YEARS AND THEY CAUSED ME PROBLEMS WITH THE EMAIL. THANKS FOR YOUR HELP IF YOU CAN HELP ME GLORIA EUBANKS —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.59.151.69 (talk) 00:05, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

It's because hotmail sucks. you should get gmail. hotmail is a pile of crap now