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Gmail: Google's approach to email

Gmail: In Your Words

Using Gmail filters I have found tons of great ways to make my life easier by emailing myself. I have set up filters so I have lists of items that don't jam up my inbox. Several of the many that I use are for movies I want to see, songs I want to download or buy, and owners manuals for items I buy. So instead of hearing about a great movie, or seeing a killer preview, only to be totally without any ideas next time at the video store or on-demand listing, anytime there's a great movie that pops up, I quickly send an email to myself with 'Movie' in the subject line and the movie's name in body of message. I set the filter to skip the inbox, now I have a list of many movies that I need to get to. Same thing with a great song I hear on satellite radio in the car or someone else's iPod. I quickly send an email from my Palm, with 'Song' in the subject. I totally love the large capacity of messages too. Whenever I buy a new gadget, item, tool, appliance, etc- I immediately go to the manufacturer's website and download the owners manual- typically pdf. I instantly email to myself with 'Manual' as the subject. Now I have one place to quickly turn when I need instructions or FAQ without having to remember where I put the manual.



Parker Harrington, Real Estate
Westwood, MA

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I am 88 years old and easily fuddled. But Gmail has made email so simple for me, that I have been problem free since I found it.



Joan Seymour, Retiree
Canada

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Gmail is like a platform where I can feel as if I'm sitting next to the people I'm talking to. I share all the emotions over chat, I organize pillow fights with people over chat, and I have intellectual debates with people over chat. Gmail helps me to be updated with everything and everyone which matters to me in my life.



Anushri Chordia, National Law University student
India

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I was originally born in Alexandria, TR, Romania. I lived there for 19 years before I had the chance to come to the United States of America. I have left my family and my friends behind, but Gmail has helped me keep in touch with all of them.



Adrian G. Mowrey, Computer Programming Student
Haddock, GA, U.S.A.

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Gmail has been awesome for my important citizen email lists. I have been been able to securely send out email updates to many citizens at once. There was a chemical manufacturing company that wanted to locate in the middle of our city, which was a risk for great disaster. Through Gmail, we are successfully fighting this company with citizen alerts.



Kathy Hammad, Community Activist
Sumner

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Believe it or not, I never get any spam using Gmail. There was a time in my life when I had to search for real emails from all the spam, but when I switched to Gmail it solved everything. Gmail is the best ever email system I have ever used.



Abdul Basit, Engineer
Finland

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I use Gmail to get in touch with my friends in other countries and to post articles to my blog. With fast, wonderful service, and connected with my other Google services, there's no word expression to indicate how great it is! I can easily get access to my Gmail anywhere due to its free POP3 and IMAP function, even using my cell phone.



Franklin Hu, Student
Shenzhen, China

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Before Gmail, it was too hectic and time-consuming to coordinate managing my email and chat messages. But now, with Gmail, I can relax. I've found a solution for getting in touch with my friends at the same time as managing my email communication.



Ramesh Chauhan, Software Engineer
India

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Thanks to Gmail's label and filter options, my inbox is full of the important emails I need while the subscriptions and newsletters are tucked away to be viewed at my leisure.



Paul Skinn, Student
Easton, PA

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I love using Gmail for receiving requests and setting up websites for my radio show.



Liam Mackessy, DJ
Ireland

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We use Gmail's 'thread utility' to help a bunch of mid 20's aged guys pass the workday by sending on nonsensical ramblings that prove to be more entertaining than doing real actual 'work.' Weekend recaps are a real joy, as well as anyone who has the time to create some humorous images using Photoshop. We recently started using Google Docs along with Gmail to help us plan events based on people's availability and even had one of our spreadsheet-savvy friends create an entire document that tracks and manages our Fantasy Slow-Pitch Softball Stats. (Yes, you read that correctly).



Brad VanGoethem, Traffic Manager
Overland Park, KS

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We use Gmail's 'thread utility' to help a bunch of mid 20's aged guys pass the workday by sending on nonsensical ramblings that prove to be more entertaining than doing real actual 'work.' Weekend recaps are a real joy, as well as anyone who has the time to create some humorous images using photoshop. We recently started using Google Docs along with Gmail to help us plan events based on people's availability and even had one of our spreadsheet-savvy friends create an entire document that tracks and manages our Fantasy Slow-Pitch Softball Stats. (Yes, you read that correctly).



Brad VanGoethem, Traffic Manager
Overland Park, KS

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With Gmail's simple but very complete filtering and label system I can stop worrying about handling different accounts for different purposes - like school, job, fun -and I can simply label, and even forward, messages according to what they say. This way I can always see only the messages I want to see.



Javier Ruiz, Engineer
Mexico City

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It was my dad's birthday and my present was to take him out to lunch at Lake Powell for a father/daughter trip. I was looking and looking for a nice restaurant in walking distance that you didn't have to spend to much on. I was emailing my step-mom about it when suddenly the Gmail ads came up and showed me tons of cheap fine dining restaurant in town. I took my dad for his birthday and he loved it he said it was the best thing about the trip.



Maddy, Student
Arizona

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We had an great idea to create a print magazine featuring fiction, poetry, photography and interviews with new and emerging writers & artists -- thus 34thParallel Magazine was born. But we had one big problem--we live on different continents! But, using Gmail as our working office we receive submissions, edit copy, contact authors and successfully collaborate using Google Docs. It's great to be able to simultaneously edit text and chat at the same time. The unlimited space allows us to receive, send, and save, photos, pdfs and magazine layouts. Gmail has made it possible for us to create a print magazine in virtual space, even though we've never worked in the same room. To date we've received hundreds of submissions and published work from almost 100 authors on 6 different continents! Our magazine would still be a dream without Gmail!



Trace Sheridan & Martin Chipperfield, Publishers and Editors of 34thParallel Magazine
Southern California & South Australia

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Gmail was a great tool for job hunting because I was able to easily communicate with multiple leads at once. However, Gmail saved me in a way that I didn't expect. I was offered two jobs at the same time. One was from a company that I wanted to work for and I felt was a great fit for me. The second offer was for another company that I wasn't as enthusiastic about but offered me significantly more money. I took the job that offered more money and hated every minute of it for two months. Thanks to the archive feature, I still had all the contact information of the hiring manager at the other company. I emailed them and they made me an offer. I may be making less, but I'm much happier!



Mike, Account Manager
Bloomington, MN

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While working on a group project in college, I created a new Gmail account and gave the password to each team member. We used it to upload files and as a place to store all of the files associated with the project. The key to organizing and making it useful was having clear subject lines so we could search for specific documents, and everything was in one place.



EK
Miami, FL

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I attended private school with the same 20 people for 6 years so I got to know them really well. When our 6th grade year came, we all went to different middle schools and did not see each other much. So we all got Gmail accounts and stayed in touch. Using Gmail let us communicate together and plan events. I even hosted a mini reunion at the beach last summer. We are still great friends because of Gmail.



Alex Gallagher, Student
San Jose, California

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Gmail has more than once saved projects that I've been working on. My university limits student email size to about 1.5 MB, which our reports always (and I mean ALWAYS) run over. So, we've found that the easiest way to transfer these files is by using Gmail! Nearly everyone has one (and a lot of people forward their university emails to their Gmail accounts, myself included), and you don't really have to worry about running out of space. It also makes it great for when you're looking up a piece of code that you know you wrote last semester, but you know got deleted off the school's servers. You know that as long as it passed through Gmail at some point, and you haven't deleted it, it's still there!



Greg Miller, Aerospace Engineering Undergraduate Student
Boulder, CO

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My husbands work requires that he be in Antarctica for many weeks at a time. Communication in the conventional ways (phone calls) are limited on the continent and we need creative ways to keep in touch. After all, we have bills to coordinate being paid, kids to take care of, and ways to connect to keep our marriage alive too! Thanks to Gmail and chat, we have been able to stay connected even from the bottom of the world.



Risa Ganel, Marriage Therapist
Columbia, MD

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I am the president of a Pastor's Wives Committee in the Florida Conference. There are over 120 pastor's wives that email updates, encouragement, and interesting articles to. With my previous service, I would have to divide the list into three separate emails in order to send a message to 120 people. It drove me crazy! But with Gmail, I write the message, click on cc, click on contacts, click group, and click send---one time!! It has made my life so much easier, and saves me a lot of hassle!



Julie, RN
Florida

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Gmail was my life line to my husband, family, and friends while I was deployed in Afghanistan and Iraq. Because of Gmail's simplicity and low need for a lot of internet data (without a lot of advertisements and graphics like other services), it was easy for me to read and reply to my emails while I was serving my combat tours. Because the internet was sooooo sllllooooowwwww over there, using Gmail was a snap.



Gracie Ramirez, US Army
Fayetteville, NC

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The way that Gmail keeps track and records conversations was really helpful for my court case. Since there was some "he said, she said" going on with phone conversations, the judge made part of the court decision that communications would be kept via email. Gmail, with the auto logging conversations, keeping both the sent messages, the drafts, and the received- with no time limit, AND the search feature.... didn't make Gmail first choice, but the ONLY choice. A email service actually became an essential part of life by its features.



Kathryn Goolsby, Butcher
Anchorage, Alaska

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Living in the Canadian Arctic is tough for many reasons, one of which is the slow-as-molasses internet connection. Every computer-user is used to watching in agony as screens fail to load. The little green bars in the bottom-right hand side of the screen can be our worst enemies and many a temper has been lost frantically clicking the "refresh" button, in hopes that a faster connection will have magically appeared in the last two seconds. More often that not, frustration results as information disappears, especially when that information is in a personal or professional email. Dealing with the dial-up has helped me grow to love Gmail's Basic HTML option. Why wait forever for the little "Loading .." sign to not come through on its promise? Instead, choose to go back to the basics, and enjoy your email much faster. Sure, you don't get all the fancy add-ons to Gmail (which are super-sweet, by the way! New colors for my labels? You know I love it). But, when you are in a pinch, and you need to know if there's a little (1) waiting in your inbox, the Basic version does just fine.



Andrew Stuhl, Volunteer Teacher
Inuvik, Canada

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I love that Gmail is universal and I have been easily been able to use it whether I was in Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, Mexico, Costa Rica or while spending time in any of the airports in between.



Bob White, English teacher
Costa Rica (previously Cambodia, Thailand, Laos, USA)

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About 7 months ago, a guy that I had been seeing (and who I was madly in love with) received a scholarship to travel to Africa for a year. Since his departure we have been emailing each other under the same subject heading "Poke poke...it's me!". I am always able to go back and read our old emails to each other and look at the progression of our relationship. The little things in Gmail make the big things like love so much easier to deal with.



Sasha De La Cruz, Student
New York City

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I originally come from New York, USA. In 1998 I decided to sell it all and backpack around the world. I've met some interesting people and had about 15 email addresses since then. Being a rolling stone, you don't always have time to check your mails every few months. I've lost so many contacts that way. After a few months of not logging in, all my mails and contacts are cleaned out of those other free services, never to be retrieved again. I've since settled down in Holland and received an invite to Gmail and have been hooked ever since. With Gmail I just don't delete anything... it's like my own private Google search engine! If I'm looking for a babysitter I used a few months ago but forgot the name... just search my Gmail. If forgot a phone number of someone I'm meeting up with tonight, but I know a keyword in a mail (place, names... ) I just Google my own Gmail.



Eric Guzman, Progress Programmer
Utrecht, Netherlands

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Winter 2006, it all began as one friend sending an email to a group of friends regarding the weekend. But this was not your ordinary email, this was the beginning of something much greater. The quartet in that original email soon increased to 14 strong. A group of guys, all in their mid 20s, many having gone to the great Ohio State University together, and some just friends of friends. Dispersed around Graduate Schools and jobs around the country; Cali, NY, Missouri, Ohio, Kentucky, Illinois, and the Caribbean is where we called home. The emails multipled exponentially by the day, leading to each person eventually registering for a Gmail account to ameliorate the problems that arise with hundreds of emails flooding one's daily inbox. The thread of single email addresses soon morphed into a full-fledged Gmail Group, which was for more than just keeping in touch. We would discuss anything and everything, from sports, to the opposite sex, to life, religion, politics, and current events. We would share interesting articles and links that we thought the group would enjoy, and of course, share anecdotes from the shenanigans that was our respective social lives. This Gmail Group kept us sane from the rigors of work and school, this was our defense mechanism against what many call the mid20s: "The Quarter-life Crisis." This Group has become a fraternity of like-minded individuals. Strangers became acquaintances, mere acquaintances became friends, and good friends became brothers. Simply a random group of friends no more...We're now the Gmail crew!



Mayank Mittal, Sales
Chicago

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I am a student who uses Gmail daily to get homework updates, quizzes, and so on. With my previous service, I would get hundreds of spam messages in my inbox, even after I had reported them as spam. I would spend hours trying to sift through all of those messages to find what I really needed. Now with Gmail, when I report spam, it never bothers me again. now I am able to spend less time looking for the homework and more time actually doing it.



Andy Webber, Student
Boston

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I needed to reference emails sent to me two years ago for specific information. The information consisted of vague bits and pieces in a long series of emails exchanged between multiple parties over several months. Because of Gmail I was able to type three words into the search field and pull up the information within seconds. Without the sheer storage capacity and efficient search engine at that precise moment in time, I could not have retrieved the information in time that eventually yielded me my dream job (i.e. my current job). I'm not sure where I would be without Gmail! I rank its overall importance to my life above my car, but slightly below my toothbrush. Probably above my girlfriend (but don't tell her that).



Eric, Federal Contractor
Virginia

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Using Gmail I include important notes when I load clients' information, including where I met them and what they purchased from me. Then I can look it up later, by simply typing in one name - like a hostess's name - and then see all those I met through that person. I can also look up clients by typing in a keyword in the 'search contacts' bar, to find which clients purchased a particular product from me, to then contact them for a reorder.



Megan Mazer, Tastefully Simple Gourmet Foods Consultant
Pennsylvania

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I'm the President of a local non-profit volunteer Arts organization. We plan monthly events focusing on local artists' work and the performing arts. We have 16 Board members across a wide spectrum of industries and professions. Keeping these professionals, their communications with me, and each other, organized should have been a complete disaster, but with Gmail, I've been able to keep all our heads above water, and we continue to have successful, well-tended events every month. I thank you, my board members thank you, and the artists whom we support thank you.



Kristi Bond, Account Manager
Kansas City

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I use Gmail in my involvement with the Southbank Bristol Arts (SBA) to track all communication from the steering group to the members. After I joined the steering group, Gmail again proved invaluable as a way of "archiving" all of our communications. I have recently been elected Chair of the SBA and the ability to just search the past archive is a fantastic resource. We now have every email sent out to the members and practically every email sent between the steering group in my Gmail account. In fact, the more we put in the more useful it seems to be. We also use Google Calendar as the "official" SBA calendar. Gmail is our complete archive!



Pete Gilbert, Artist / Chair of Southbank Bristol Arts
Bristol, UK

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Gmail is perfect for my online tarot business because it sorts mail automatically by date and conversation. For me, my whole business consists of conversations! Each one is basically a small project for me. Gmail offers me exactly the organizational structure I need for my business.



Tara Dorscher, Engineer and Tarot Card Reader
Perth, Australia

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Gmail has been our lifeline while traveling over 8,000 miles in our motor-home. We have stayed in touch family and conducted our business by way of Gmail...



Richard Gordon, Retired
Dawson, AL

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As a divorce lawyer, the ability to communicate with my clients in confidence is key. That means the old family email account is off limits... There is nothing worse than to find out that the your client's spouse is reading your email about the divorce strategy. When I take a new case, I send my clients a Gmail invitation so we can send documents back and forth, collaborate with clients on pleadings and plan strategy in confidence and security.



Eric Ballinger, Divorce Lawyer
Canton, Georgia

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I started using Gmail during my undergrad program at University of Phoenix. Gmail is great for online chat meetings and exchanging ideas. My whole team had Gmail accounts which made team projects a breeze. Currently I am working on my MBA and I setup a team email account so that the team members are able to log in drop off assigned pieces of team projects. The team email has helped us tremendously.



Floyd Webster, System Administrator
Atlanta, GA

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Gmail continues to help me to stay in touch with my friends from Ukraine now that they aren't in the US anymore. They send me photos of their art work and travels, we exchange music, and we chat using the messaging system. Gmail helped to strengthen our friendship and now it's almost as though we became closer once we were far away.



Sam Roe, Student
Lewes, Delaware

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This Christmas I traveled out of Hong Kong and I made use of Gmail's POP3 function to retrieve my emails from my five different email addresses - some of which are from my business email addresses. I was extremely pleased to find that I can access, receive, reply or send an email on any available computer and still make it look like it is originating from my professional email address...



Lynda Shen, Proofreader
Hong Kong

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I am as close to paperless as I think I can ever be, thanks to Gmail. I have a website for patients, which I started longer ago than I care to say. Before Gmail, and its generous storage, I kept clippings to write from if they weren't for that day but were interesting...they stacked up and get yellow...and it just never worked as I wanted. Now I email journal abstracts to myself so I always have originals. I email news stories which I won't write from but which have interesting background info, too. I have on my laptop every journal article I wanted to save, etc...and instead of having to be super organized (some stories could fit into any number of topics)...all I need to do is search mail to find what I am looking for.



Cheree Cleghorn, Editor
Washington, DC

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I love the way that way I have everything all at my fingertips from around the world with Gmail. I can travel anywhere and get email and contacts from any computer, or from any wireless phone. I used to hate going from work to home, and needing to email some people from my home account, not knowing the email, as it was stored locally on my home machine. Now, I can just log into Gmail and have it all at my fingertips.



Brandon, Consultant
Illinois

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I spent my last year of college doing internships in Veterinary Hospitals. It was a really really busy year and I had little time for family or friends! The last four months of the internship were spent in Spain....then, not only was I away from everyone I knew, I was also in a different country, with a different language! Thanks to Gmail, I was able to stay in touch with those I love, especially with my boyfriend. I sent photos from my work and from all the places I visited, and received photos from everyone back home. And now...I have all those memories stored in my account....just a click away!!! And more....I'm a veterinarian thanks to Gmail!! While I was away from home, I completed my final graduation thesis, always safely stored, and accessible all over the globe. I remember I actually worked on my thesis at the Barcelona Airport....without a laptop of my own!!!



Marta Cipriano, Veterinarian
Lisbon, Portugal

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My Fiancee and I (since before we were engaged) have used Gmail to communicate daily as I work in San Jose, CA and her in Modesto, CA. After making my long drive from Modesto daily, We would hit up Gmail to keep in touch through out the day. We have now exchanged over 7,500 emails and I am not even counting chats. I have EVERY message since the first day we met (on eharmony) and counting...



Jason Slack, Software Engineer
San Jose, CA

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I was an exchange student in 1994, sent from Melbourne, Australia to Colorado, USA. During the first few weeks, I met a guy called Mike - another exchange student, from the Philippines. I was just 15, and Mike 16, so we weren't all that well-versed in courting rituals. We attended his prom together, wrote letters, talked on the phone. In August, he returned to the Phils. As this was prior to email, we wrote a few letters to each other, but this quickly died out as he started college and I completed my year in the States. After 10 years, a few things had prompted me to look for his address, and in 2004 I wrote to his parents, supplying them with my Gmail address. Mike had actually just moved back into his parents' place again, and wrote right back. We started using Gmail to email and chat, mostly because it was the only net-based mail service not blocked by my school administrators! After a few years of what had become almost constant contact, I decided to visit the Phils to see if the guy that had been my first kiss all those years ago was still as special now. We knew it was the moment I walked out of the airport doors, and we married on July 7, 2007. Life is good! (Or, as they say in Tagalog; 'Sarap ng Buhay!')



Megan, Teacher
Manila, Philippines

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I got each of my students a Gmail account so that they could submit their assignments online. I could keep tabs on them to make sure they observed deadlines and uploading attachments on Gmail is faster and more efficient than any other email service. I also use Google Calendar to keep my students informed of our studies schedule, tests and quizzes. We had a ongoing tutorial with questions and students answering each others' questions on the documents feature. No one could complain that they didn't know we were having a quiz or a deadline for submitting an assignment. They could have a quick tutorial from home in the evenings if they were stuck on something. And a one-on-one chat with a student who is too shy to ask a question in class is worth its weight in gold. As a teacher, I love it and parents and students were very grateful. Gmail is a great teaching tool.



Wally Zeisig, High School Science Teacher
Kuwait

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Locally, we have a swap meet called Larryville.com which acts like Craigslist. Last year, a kid named Case started to collect items for people in need around Holiday time. He was unable to complete this task this year and I volunteered to run the program. I signed up for a Gmail account and am using it to track requests and get donations. The color coded label function allows a friend and I to keep track of all the people in need of help. It has been a great tool to use and organize all the donations to people. We have helped raise over $1000 worth of donations and that number is still rising. Gmail is just making it much more efficient.



Jeff Pierce, Pharmacist
Lawrence, KS

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I am a home-schooled teen living in rural Wisconsin, and I just want to say that Gmail is possibly one of the greatest things ever to enter into my life. One of the FAQ I get when I say I am home-schooled is "how do you socialize?" Gasp! Because obviously you CAN'T socialize in ANY OTHER form other than at a regular school environment! And to that I say, well, you obviously have not heard about Gmail. Since all of my friends live in the Minneapolis\St. Paul area, it is a very long drive to get together with them, but thanks to my mom, I get to see them about once or twice a week. I also take classes with them during the regular school session about once or twice a week, but as any teen knows, talking once or twice a week doesn't cut it. Enter Gmail. With Gmail, I talk to my friends at least twice a day, usually more, and we all join group chats to discuss stuff that is happening in the world today. Plus, I can send them great YouTube videos, and the favor is returned. I can stay connected to them, even though they all live at least an hour away. Living an hour away from all your friends isn't easy, but Gmail makes it way better.



Hannah, Student
Wisconsin

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When I had to travel to London on business recently, I had to get a passport for the first time in my life. The backlog at the State Department made me worry about losing it--how long would it take to replace it? So, just in case, I scanned the passport into a JPG and then emailed the file to myself. I left for London secure in the knowledge that I could produce an image of my passport from anywhere with web access.



Karen Wester Newton, Publishing System Manager
Rockville, MD, USA

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Gmail is the first email service I have used that blocked out a lot of frightening spam. Since I'm a kid, that's important to me, and to my mom. : ) I also liked how when this one type of spam kept getting through, I hit one button and it never showed up again.



Lily
New York

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I started using Gmail from the beginning and after I setup a firm selling IRC shells I decided it was in my business interest to use Gmail as the official support email. It has been over a year and a half and it's amazing. Not a single hour or day of downtime. How could I say it better: I have trusted and built my business with Gmail, and because of the search feature I managed to find in seconds using referral numbers I previously put into emails sent to clients all the information I needed in time for support.



Hodirlan Cristian, Administrator
Oradea, Romania

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I use Gmail to communicate with the world... being autistic and having a neuro-degenerative disease makes me terrible at managing information. Gmail with IMAP helps me do this by acting as an assistant to me, and allows me to continue to run my small brokerage at ease.



Alin Steglinski, Stock Trader
Palatine, IL

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I use Gmail as an email "hub". All my email accounts forward to my Gmail account, and I can send mail from any account I want with Gmail. Since I've signed up for Gmail, it's made my life so much simpler because now I only have to check one place for email, and I can send from any of my needed addresses. Gmail is easy, fast, and fun. Especially with Keyboard Shortcuts.



Nicholas Jensen
Grants Pass Oregon

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Our business relies on email-based orders. When our internet service provider went down today, we could not get email from our clients nor send them email. Fortunately, we use Gmail as a backup. Within only a few minutes, our staff, which is spread through 3 states, was able to communicate and notify clients that they could contact us via Gmail. I would estimate Gmail saved us several thousand dollars in lost orders today alone. Awesome!



Dean Rotbart, Publisher
Beverly Hills

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I am a grandmother and not very familiar with modern technology. With Gmail, I run my international business from my home and I contact suppliers all over the world as well as buyers in the USA. Much of my success is due to Gmail and the convenience of not having to type in an address, but just clicking the right letter to find them. I also value the storage space and ability to operate many accounts simultaneously.



Malini Perera, Entrepreneur
New York

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I have used Gmail since it first came out, and I must say it gets better and better. I have a photography studio, and I am very busy answering client emails. Well my web server email program crashed, and I was unable to retrieve any messages. I logged into Gmail and set up external email accounts. Viola, I got all of my email delivered to my Gmail from my business email account, instantly! I was hooked, and to this day, I use Gmail to check all of my email accounts. It's so convenient to have this functionality in one place!



Joshua Westbrook, Photographer
Athens, GA USA

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With Gmail I have archived, the changes, thrills, sucesses and failures of my first relationship, ended friendships, moving from high school to college, my first, next and grown-up jobs; the ending of ties with my father, the renewal of ties to the rest of my family, and the discovery of tools that changed my internet experience as well as my life and study habits. I can email notes to the boyfriend I had class with, search through old chats for the phone number I forgot, discover new tools like the blog, goog-411 (i'm never lost anymore) and Google scholar (I don't have to buy half my textbooks anymore) as well as Google images - all because I got this Gmail account. And now I keep in touch with friends who are far away, and life moves on, but we are able to keep talking and our relationships don't disintegrate.



Ariel, Student and part-time DHS worker
Portland, OR

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Upon entering college four months ago, I was convinced my college email address would be able to handle everything I needed. Unfortunately it filled within a month and wouldn't let me receive new messages. My business school mentor told me to use Gmail since it was the most amazing thing he'd ever used on the computer. I couldn't deal with the hassle of deleting messages from my mailbox every two days on my college account. With Gmail I'm able to get my mail from the other account, keep it organized and make sure that I don't miss anything important when sorting my mail. I also keep in touch with my parents and sister a lot more now since I don't have a lot of time to make phone calls but Gmail is always there! Gmail saved my life more than a few times this semester, the hardest one of my college career hopefully, by always saving everything right down to the drafts of my emails, seconds after I've written them. Gmail also saved me when my computer screen died hours before a final paper was due and I was able to get the file off a different computer in the library.



Rebecca, College Student
George Washington University, Washington D.C.

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While working on a very hot item for production, our company server decided to start stripping out attachments and I had one unhappy client on my hands. I directed them to my Gmail account and was able to retrieve the files and continue with production. In fact, after I left for the day, I was notified of more changes. So, I retrieved the file at the juice and coffee bar of my local gym and was able to complete and forward to final production.



Scott Sparks, Client Services Rep
Bixby, Oklahoma

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I use Gmail primarily for FUN! My friends and I have created our own version of the classic Madlibs word game. We take original bodies of text from a variety of sources, such as business emails, personal blogs, and classified postings, then substitute much funnier words to make it more interesting and silly. One of the features I like best about Gmail is the ability to go into my archives and read old Madlibs of the past for a good laugh. I also find it quite convenient to do the same to look for directions to someone's home or something that was emailed to me a while back.



Kim
Hollywood, FL

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Gmail saved my relationship with my girlfriend. I lived in Edmonton,Alberta, Canada for a year with my girlfriend. Then I received fantastic news, I had been offered a scholarship to get my MBA in business down in St. Louis and play university hockey. My girlfriend coincidentally received an offer to work up north in the Oil Fields in Canada making fantastic money. Neither of us could pass up these opportunities. Where she went, there were no phones. Messenger was blocked on her work computer, as were all other chat programs. For a few days we thought that we would have to break things off, since we had absolutely no contact. But then we started talking on Gmail chat. In fact, the only way we could talk was through Gmail chat. We spoke 1-2 hours a day on Gmail while she spent 6 months up in the remote parts of Northern Canada saving all the money she could. Our conversations kept us so close that when she was finished, she moved down here to St Louis with me, while I finish up my masters at University. I don't think we could have survived the time apart without Gmail chat.



Ryan F., Grad. Student
Lebanon, IL

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I've been working with clients who send me huge files for me to work on (MSV, DVF, WAV, MP3,PPT, PDF, XLS, etc.). I used to have to open lots of email accounts to be able to accommodate the size of these files. Now, I don't have to. With Gmail, I get to store all my work files without having to delete. It also allows me to keep track of deadlines, conversations and transactions. Spam isn't a problem for me either. It's great!



KYS Valderia, Freelance Writer and Transcriber
Manila, PH

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I am Indian and do not know Spanish. I applied for a PhD position in Spain and I was asked to fill and submit an application form for that. The irony is that I do not know anything in Spanish and the forms were completely in Spanish. So I used Gmail chat with 3 of my friends from various parts of the globe. One of my friend knows Spanish while another one corrected my documents and the third one verified it. Wow! It was fun. Gmail could store all our chats and I could easily copy and fill the forms. Moreover, it is unique that the chat was inbuilt and does not disconnect like other download-needed chat systems. I filled it in and sent it for grant application successfully! Let it be brainstorming, fun with friends or attachments to be sent in a jiffy, Gmail is the best! Thanks for being a part in my life.



S. Kalyanasundaram, Scientific Researcher
New Delhi, India

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I'm happy because I'm down to one email (they all forward to Gmail), and the spam they didn't catch, Gmail does! It's nice to know when my iGoogle says "Inbox (1)", I actually have a relevant message and I'm not wasting my time deleting yet another spam. Thank you for reclaiming my Inbox.



Chris Stepaniuk, Software Engineer
Calgary, Canada

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I have been using Gmail for over 1 year now and the ease and comfort provided is par excellence. Also the way it handles spam is outstanding...almost 95% of my daily count of about 50-60 spam mails are filtered directly into the spam box...I just wonder where I would be if this was not the case.



Jitendra Adhikari, IT Specialist
Secunderabad, India

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Spam filtering is second to none. If something gets through, it only gets through once. I tell Gmail that it's spam, and it's never seen or heard from again. On the flip side, if something is accidentally labeled as spam, a couple of clicks, and poof, it's all acceptable.



Frank. ATM Technician
Western USA

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I received an email from a gentleman in Beijing, China and he was interested in collaborating on a book he was writing. To make a long story short, he and I collaborated and wrote "The Mango Tree Cafe, Loi Kroh Road" via internet and instant messaging from Gmail. We've never met each other or talked on the phone. Gmail chat worked just fine for us! Pretty incredible considering he is on the other side of the world from me! The book is now available and we have 2 YouTube videos online, and a Blog capturing our progress on the book. Plus, the book has even been nominated for a Pulitzer Prize!



Taryn Simpson, Freelance Writer
Nashville, TN

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As a journalist, I'm always trying to find new sources, and usually it's an active, time-consuming process on my part. The ads that are placed inside the compose cell of my email account, tailored as they are to my subjects, have more than once provided me with a new organization or interviewee for an article. That's cool!



French Clements, Freelance Writer
Lee, MA

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I wear a lot of hats. A LOT of hats. I like that Gmail can easily give me an account for each hat. My genealogy goes to one account, my journal account goes to another, my paranormal mail goes to a third, and so on. Within each email account are sub-categories. I have ADD and this helps me keep my head together. Probably the most unusual account is my home school account. My children each have their own school-related Gmail addresses and I send them links and assignments via those accounts; they write reports in the replies. It's quick, it's easy, and I can keep track of all of it
in a click.



Maer, Genealogist, Home Schooling Mom, Artist, Writer ...
Ontario, Canada

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I have a business consulting with architects, engineers, building owners, etc. regarding historic sites. The need to exchange scanned images and huge drawing files was not being handled with grace or dignity by my existing infrastructure. Big files typically would crash and burn in transmission, which necessitated embarrassing apologies. A graphic designer I work with, who was having similar frustrations, began using Gmail and suggested I look into it. What a transformative
day! Not only did I get a great Gmail address that totally describes what I do, but now I can say with confidence, "Send me the file!" or conversely, "I'll send you the image." It's been great for business!!



Anne, Architectural Historian
Cross Plains, WI

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Being a business student isn't easy considering we can have up to 5 group projects going on at the same time. With all these business plans and presentations floating around it's hard to keep what is going on separate. But since I have found Gmail I can do the work all while keeping my sanity. I'm happy and so are my group members.



Melanie Lajeunesse, Student
West Palm Beach

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I use Gmail and Google Docs to write my wedding ceremonies. Once a wedding is booked, we swap ideas for the custom ceremonies online via Docs, and on a couple of occasions when brides have forgotten their vows, I have been able to access them and print them out at the wedding location. Saved the day!



Debi Ashe, Minister
New Hampshire

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My husband is in Iraq, and Gmail is the only means of communication I have with him. I know that none of his words will get lost or deleted, and when I am sad or lonely, I can easily find my favorite messages of his, to reassure me. Gmail has helped keep my love alive!



Felicia Minto-Rodman, Student
Washington

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I was a missionary in Mexico for 7 years and now when I'm on Gmail, I can talk to other missionaries. It's been a great way to keep in touch with friends in other countries.



Toni Bookman, Graphic Artist
Texas

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I lost touch with so many of my friends when I left school and they've started this group email that has updates about all their lives, photographs and stuff. Friends I lost touch with are now getting
married and are sending me invitations to their weddings. I know that because of Gmail, I can keep in touch with them and see how they've all changed. It's a letter that never stops sending us updates and we're all in different parts of the world and Gmail is the best way to get in touch with everyone!



Anna, Postgrad Student
Newcastle, UK

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I use Google tools: email, Docs, and Calendar for all my grade 9, 11, and 12 socials and history classes who do all their work on class laptops. I do all my classes and work online through Google tools. The students, almost 120, pick up their work with their Gmail account and open them with Google Docs. When they are finished they email me the results after completion. I share my Google Calendar with all the students and they can then keep up with the class even if they are ill or on vacation. On occasion they have a real time chat with me on Gmail chat. Without Google, all of this would not be possible.



Ken Stokowski, Teacher
Gibsons British Columbia Canada

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I have done a lot of travel in the last year, 14 countries in 12 months! I have missed my family, my pets and my home but it was strangely comforting to me that wherever I went my Gmail Inbox was the same. I used Chat to stay in touch with my nearest and dearest. It's funny, Gmail's interface became the interior of an online virtual home that never changed.



Patrick, Adventurer
Washington D.C.

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A friend and I exchange music files of us singing and playing guitar and we layer over each others tunes with our own harmonies and send them back! Jamming across the hemispheres!



Lesley, CEO of YoYoDyne Industries
Australia

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A friend and I exchange music files of us singing and playing guitar and we layer over each others tunes with our own harmonies and send them back! Jamming across the hemispheres!



Lesley, CEO of YoYoDyne Industries
Australia

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My best friend of 23 years moved from Virginia to a little village in Ethiopia to work for The Clinton Foundation. Gmail and Gmail chat has allowed our girl-talk to continue! There is a 7 hour time
difference but we always find time to gossip, laugh, confide, complain, celebrate, and our friendship and conversations continue.



Sandi
Virginia

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I have no great story to share nor shining moment of revelation to detail on. Quite simply, Gmail does what it's supposed to - make email friendly again. From backing up my personal data by emailing it to myself, to never having to delete an email again, Gmail has simplified my work flow. Gmail puts the fun in functionality.



Kyle, Communication Specialist
North Dakota

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I used to get well over 12,000 spam messages (this is not an exaggeration) in my inbox a month before I switched to Gmail. Ifilter my other email accounts through Gmail just to get rid of all the spam!



Jacinda Phillips, Business Owner/Operator
Portland, Oregon

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I am currently a foreign exchange student in a small Argentine town. I will be gone a total of ten months. Being only 16 I was as scared as I was excited to leave my town in Oregon and come to this new country. The mail system here hardly works and so a letter can take weeks, but with Gmail I can talk with my family and friends and keep everyone up to date as well as talk with my counselors back to prepare for college. Without Gmail my experience as an exchange student would have been really difficult but thanks to you, I can keep in touch and experience a new culture. When I go back to the states next summer I know Gmail will be useful in keeping in contact with all of the new friends and people I meet here. Gmail is my connection to the world.



Audrey Lewiw, Student
Isla Verde, Argentina

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My husband and I work opposite shifts so we don't see each other on the weekends. I am 8 1/2 months pregnant and Gmail takes a lot of worry out of our lives. My husband works for a company that does not allow him to install programs such as other messengers. With Gmail chat being web-based he can just leave the window open and be there for me when and if I need him. When our special day comes I will message him on Gmail chat before I will call his job.



Roxanne Aviles, Psychiatry Office Manager
Winter Springs, Florida USA

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The best part of Gmail is the ability to attach files all at once instead of waitng for each individual attachment to upload like other services that take forever to upload each individual file. Recently while working on a large commercial real estate transaction I was able to effectively upload contract documents and addendums with great ease. I formated my email, attached my files and hit the send button and walked away to continue other important tasks. All of these documents had to be submitted in an expeditious manner to make the deal happen. As a result of Gmail, I was able to secure a 3.7 million dollar contract deal that netted me a hefty commission check.



Michael, Real Estate Broker
Miami, Florida

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I have an 11 year old who wanted so much to keep in touch with family in another state with email. I set her up an account with another provider a couple of years ago but no matter how hard I tried, I could never prevent inappropriate email from getting through. I had to stop letting her use it. I started using Gmail many months ago and noticed that I never got ONE unsolicited email. Not one. I decided that it would be safe to set her up with an account and it's worked perfectly. I've really pushed it as an option for the kids in our family and they absolutely love it...



Rachel, Software Support
Texas

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I am in the field artillery currently deployed in Iraq. I keep in contact with all my family through Gmail, and I also tried to do something else. For 4 years, I have been single, and I could never
find the "right" one close to my last girl. She was everything a man could want. Then we went our seperate ways, and I got deployed. Being down here makes you think of the past and how you could've changed it. Well, I looked around, found the one I lost, on Gmail, and we started to talk. Chatting is the first step, then we started to talk about the old times. Chat was always fast, no delay from emails, pictures are sent in great formats, and I think nothing could've gone wrong. You have made us connect in a way that we never have before.



Jonathan Marrero, U.S. Army
Iraq

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A few months ago I made an online purchase, but the item never made it. I needed a confirmation code in an email sent to me some time before. If I had to delete my emails on a regular basis I would not have had the code and would not have received the item. Gmail has saved this High School Senior's internet buying experience.



Kade Lyons, Student
Utah

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I was a newly-wed when I went to Bahrain for work and my husband was left in the Philippines. We used Gmail to communicate everyday and every minute just like chatting. Thanks to Gmail, I dont need to delete all the conversations we've had for the last 14 months. Thanks for making our very, very long distance relationship feels like were just a seat apart.



Mai, Medical Transcriptionist
Bahrain

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I use Gmail as my hard drive for my papers. This way I know when I go to school to print out a paper, I never have to worry about whether or not the computer can read my file saver. When computers switched from floppy discs to jump-drives, I couldn't afford one. I quickly learned it was faster and easier to just email the documents to myself and archive them. Now I can access all my papers and not take up computer space!



Elizabeth, Graduate Student
San Diego, CA

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I'm a meeting planner by trade, but my address book is a mess. I've probably asked my best friend for her address in Arlington, VA three times. I finally put two and two together and asked her in Gmail chat, so now anytime I need it, I can find it in the saved chats. Now she never needs to know I don't remember it!



Judith, Meeting Planner
Boston, MA

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My daughter attended college in our hometown, delaying any "empty nest" sadness on my part. However, the day after she graduated from college in 2002, she packed her little car up and moved to Dallas where she now lives. I would have been much sadder if I did not have Gmail to help us remain in contact through stressful job searches, break-ups with boyfriends, lost cell phones, and other crises. I have saved over 1400 emails that I will someday combine in a scrapbook as a sort of history of our relationship.



Earlene Caldwell, Therapist
Corpus Christi, Texas

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I work for a state senator who often needs someone's phone number en route to a meeting, or from the floor of the Illinois Senate. I constantly use the search mail feature to find contact information from weeks or even months ago in just a few seconds... I can't imagine what I'd do without it! Also, I was able to chat with my fiance during his 2 month engineering practicum in Guam this summer, even while he was monitoring a radio tower and I was at work. It made the separation much easier.



Laura, Legislative Aide
Chicago

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I'm in a band called Mercury Descends. The other four members and I met while serving in the US Military stationed in Japan. After a couple of semi-succesful years making music, our military commitments landed us all in different parts of the world. We continued making music by recording our individual parts of songs and sending the files to eachother via Gmail. Our latest album entitled "Foreign Protocol" was written almost entirely over the internet with the help of Gmail. Thanks to you guys, we were able to keep the creative juices flowing and communicate musical ideas without the use of phones. You saved us many awkward conversations and loads of phone charges. It's much easier than sitting the phone down in front of you while you play a guitar riff for a bandmate who is half way across the world. We're still making music and using Gmail to share ideas with each other. 2/5 of Mercury Descends is still in the military with one deployed to the Middle East. Without Gmail, there's just no way we could continue our musical endeavors.



Alan Mabee, Student
Carbondale, IL

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Gmail is reliable and keeps me in touch with my wife back home in florida all the way here from Iraq. The pictures always work and I get every email that she sends me of my 5 month old daughter. Thanks for letting me watch my daughter grow up since I cant be there in person.



Bobby Draughon, Army
Iraq

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I use Gmail to run an archaeological project. It is highly effective because it shows strings of conversations. I interact with hundreds of random students and then I can pretend I remember what they all said.



Samuel Connell, Archaeologist
California & Ecuador

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I do repairs and modifications to my car and take pictures with my cell phone. I then email them to my Gmail account so I can share them with people on message boards.



Tim G., Auto Mechanic
Pawtucket, RI

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About 10 months ago I was diagnosed with brain cancer. One of the unfortunate side effects of the location of my tumor is short term memory loss. I needed some kind of tool to enable myself to send myself reminders and notes on the go. Before the cancer diagnosis, I was a constant Gmail user. I had even started using Gmail for mobile applications. I used mobile Gmail so much that it made sense to adjust my usage slightly in order to help make up for my new disability. Now I use Gmail constantly to give myself reminders and to correspond with friends and supporters while I am on the go between appointmen... Without Google applications, I would have had a much harder time getting through this bought with brain cancer. I'm not through yet, but I will continue to use Google as my crutch for as long as I still need it.



Michael Brown, Financial Analyst
Chicago

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This fall I was trying to study for the law school admissions exam. I didn't have the time or the money to take a class but I did have a brother in law who scored in the 99th percentile and was willing to tutor me. Unfortunately he lived in St. Louis and I lived in Phoenix. He came up with the idea to use Gmail chat for our tutoring sessions. Not only did we save a ton of money on our phone bills but Gmail chat saved a record of our conversation, so I also had something to refer back to when I was studying on my own. Gmail is awesome! It works almost as hard as I do.



Janelle Sheppard, Marketing & Communications Coordinator
Phoenix, Arizona

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Gmail has helped me organize important college emails that I have received, containing information about my applications and scholarship programs. As a senior in high school, keeping track of these things is VERY important! Gmail has helped me (with its STAR method) pull out my "important" emails and seperate them from the "not-so important." Gmail is fast and efficient.



Majesta, High School Senior
California

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As an up-and-coming radio disk jockey, Gmail gives me an easy way to contact show promoters and search through emails with ease! I am able to upload my demo reel and resume with no problems and send them off to professional radio stations so I can get a job! Gmail has also helped me to keep in contact with my boyfriend; we've been in a long-distance relationship for two and a half years. As if all this wasn't enough, I'm constantly using Gmail to transport documents that I'm working on for my college classes! Gmail makes my life easier.



Cristin, Radio Disk Jockey
Boston, MA

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I have many brothers, who are currently all deployed in the Middle East or working with the Peacekeeper units in Kosovo. Thanks to the way Gmail integrates with my cell phone, I can access my email or the Gmail chat client so I can be available whenever my brothers have a chance to be near a computer. It's helped us keep in closer contact during this long deployment.



Tara, Legal Secretary
Minnesota

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I use Gmail labels to create my recipe book that I can access from anywhere. I love to cook, and I rarely cook anything twice, so I am constantly Googling for more recipes. Every time I find a good one, I email it to my Gmail account and tag it as a "recipe". One click on that tag and all my recipes are available to me, even from my blackberry (with Gmail Mobile) so that I can stop at the grocery store for ingredients on my way home from work. I love it!



Stephanie Cupp, Software Design
Washington, DC

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The setup: My wife, 7 months pregnant, with twins. Her parents, in the Dominican Republic on vacation. My sister-in-law, working in France for the summer. The plot: My wife's water breaks. The doctors determine that our twin girls will be born within the week, two months early. Her parents are not due to return for three more days. We can't call her parents from the hospital, and there's no way I'm leaving my wife alone. How Gmail saved the day: using Gmail on my blackberry, I email my sister-in-law in France. We spend some time chatting, and she calls the parents. They change their flight to Tuesday, and get to the hospital on Tuesday night. The next day, our twins are born, and their grandparents are there. The Epilogue: I post all of their first pictures, from the hospital's wireless, on my Picasa site, and share it with friends and family, using my Gmail address.



Thomas Bowers, IT
Connecticut

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Getting Gmail on my blackberry using the robust blackberry client is what makes Gmail for me. The fact that I can check my Gmail all the time allows me to keep in touch.



Glenn, IT Architect
Canada

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The Gmail format is ideal for tracking trades that can take months to negotiate, simply by using the same subject string, you can track the entire history...


Dave Sears, Consultant / Trade
Ukraine

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I am SEO. When I surf through internet I find lots of websites, but have problems managing and finding them again. So I use Gmail! I save all important websites in a draft and give them a relevant subject. When I put a URL, I put one line brief description about it. So when I need any information I search within Gmail by the keyword. This way I easily find all the data which I need. Due to this, I can stop bookmarking.



Sweta, E-marketing
India

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I run a website where I host Beastie Boys remixes. Running the site means I have to deal with LOTS of email and LOTS of contacts. I have used Gmail for day-to-day operations for almost 2 years now. I host 75 different DJ's, each one has a nickname so I use the labeling feature of Gmail to label their emails automatically when they come in so I know who's mailing me. I use contact groups to get in touch with my hosted DJ's for special events to all of them at once, it couldn't be easier. Plus, with the mobility, my Gmail goes wherever there's internet access! Not having to worry about storing, backing up, or spam/viruses takes the stress off of me and lets me worry about running my site(s) and not about the things that Gmail worries about for me.



Silence7, Master of the Web
So. Cal, USA

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When my youngest child graduated from college and was accepted in the PHD program in Binghamton NY I was excited at first for her, but then the reality of her being a very long distance from me set in. About that time she invited me to join Gmail. Now, even when she is extremely busy (which she is between teaching and her own classes) I get to "see" her. When I sign on and I see her green or orange "light" it makes me feel better, knowing she is ok. Sorry, I'm just a 'mom'.



Linda Tilley
Kentucky

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I am an overseas business trader working for a small exporting company. I use Gmail as the main way to communicate with the foreign customers on every sample and every order. In the past 3 years, I never lost any email - sent or received - even with very big attachments. And now, all our people in this company use Gmail to receive email and chat. What's really good is the conversation of email, especially for our business working, since it's easy for our paper printing work and easy to search.



Helene, Foreign Trade
China

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When I was in grad school, and would have to transfer large "papers" in progress back in forth between my apt. and school (I would do work on them in both places), a key drive wouldn't always work, and not all computers were equipped for one. So I would send the paper to my Gmail, and then hit 'save as draft'- then I could just go home (or to school), open it up and there it was! I could continue working on it, and then save it once again till the next opportunity when I'd have more time to work on it. It didn't even have to be mailed, or downloaded since Gmail merely saved it for me in a "safe" holding space!



Sheryl, Social Worker
Israel

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While in Iraq, Gmail kept me connected with my fiancee. The phones were always busy, so I would log on at all hours of the day, hoping to get a quick response, but rarely getting one, because of the
time difference. But sometimes, a little chat window would pop up, with her screen name on it, and we would talk for way past the designated limit. But without both the email and the chat, our love never would have been shared as it was. We have now been happily married for over 6 months, with no end in sight, and little fear of next deployment.



Chris Ness, Marine
Oceanside, CA

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Recently I started a newspaper at my high school. Getting papers in from peers was always a struggle since I would normally only get a piece of paper with their story on it and I would have to copy it over by retyping it. But with my Gmail account I put together a few other accounts for my writers so that they could all use Google Docs to send them to me quick and painlessly, allowing me to give pointers and suggestions instantly.



David Meade, High School Student
California

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My mom's on old fashion dial up with her email provided on her desktop. For years I've been hearing her complain about the amount of inappropriate junk mail she gets all mixed in with her church mailers and quilter newsletters. I've never been able to do much by the way of filtering her mail... Then one day, as I'm checking over my news headlines, friend blogs, and recipes on my Google homepage, it hits me! Why not set my mom up with a Gmail account and a customized homepage!? An hour later I'd set up her internet provider email address to deliver its contents to her new Gmail account, given her a seashore themed customized homepage with recipes, daily bible verses and her own junk-mail-sorting Gmail account. I did it all from my computer at home without her knowledge and then stopped over at her place to upload her addresses and set Google as her homepage. It was a wonderful surprise!



Lea Stewart, Secretary
Waterloo, Iowa

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Gmail connects me to my friends, my work, and my family. All my different email accounts are funneled into my Gmail. The labels help me keep every thing straight so I never miss a beat or an email.



Jordan, Student
Cedarfalls, IA

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A group of guys and I have the same class called CWP, where we have to write speeches, resolutions, and notes. The four of us use Gmail to proof read and coordinate what we have in the adgenda for the upcoming day.



Nick Boucher, High School Senior

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I run an environmental organization that has no paid employees so the free price of Gmail rocks! I have email accounts set up through my domain, but hate using the pop mail accounts that come with my service. So I've set up different Gmail accounts for each of my steering committee members. Then they can create their own groups, documents, email account (pulling in pop from web domain email, but still reply with our domain email!), etc. like volunteers, booths, performers, and sponsors. Then each new volunteer can just take control of an account and have everything they need to get started year after year!



April Ambrose, Environmental Organizer and Leader
Arkansas

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Gmail's color-coded labels help me organize all my school subject related emails so I know which subject related email is at any point I want to find it!



Boris Plotkin, Student
Toronto, Ontario

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I have used Gmail for about 4 years now. I coach and manage two premiere youth soccer teams. Gmail has helped me so much!! The ability to keep all the messages with one subject lumped together is priceless. When I send an email to 20 people I get one message back....Awesome!!!



Shawn Kramer, Telecom
Vancouver, WA

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Gmail is great for the range because every officer is at a different location around the range with internet enabled laptops, so the chat really helps communication around the 1000 square yard range.



John Tarbell, Rocketry Range Tech Student
East Longmeadow, MA

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This story is written by my parents as I am still learning to speak words at my 12 months of age. My parents thought I should have an email address reserved that should keep all my memories while I grow up. So they decided to get me a Gmail address. They send me all that's happened in my life during my initial days, months and years as emails to this address. They also created a blog in my name and the memories are shared there and sent as emails... Thanks for giving me my first email id. I will cherish that all my life and will send you an email once I start typing myself.



Kedaar Nandan
Seattle, WA

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When Pomona College decided that they could only hold onto our college email addresses for six months after graduation the class of 2007 basically "freaked out." But one by one we were turned on to Gmail by word of mouth and now basically all of us are online, most of us adopting the Pomona College way of assigning names. Kinda cute!



Jenny, PR
NYC

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I have scanned in and emailed to myself most of my important documents like my passport, driver's license, medical licenses, and medical school, internship and residency diplomas. These are all documents which you sometimes need copies of when you are traveling. And a loss while out of town could be disastrous. Now I have instant access anywhere in the world!



E. Smith, Physician
New York, NY

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Gmail enables me to hold more items, so now I use it kind of like a filing cabinet. If I update my resume, add items to my dream car spreadsheet, or check off items on my Christmas list, I simply search for the archived file and upload a new copy.



Chris, Server Engineer
Pennsylvania

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Gmail is the new Cupid. Gmail's green chat light meant "go" for love in my life. My girlfriend and I used the service to communicate in a class we were both in during college. We used it for projects and homework at first, but then for flirting, pinning down a location for a first date, emoticon hearts and more. We were even able to go back 7 months down the road and track our relationship from the beginning. Love may have brought us together in the long run, but with Gmail's help, we can now archive months of love letters and maybe an XO or two.Now every time I see a green light, I see a new opportunity full of limitless possibilities and a love story in the making.



Jordan Burleson, Advertising Consultant
Hickory, NC

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I run a youth recording program in Murfreesboro and Nashville that gives teenagers hands on education in the art of recording. I had all my students sign up for Gmail and now anytime someone has a question it goes to all the students, and they all work together to find the answers. We then created a Google document that they can all edit, and are compiling everything they learn into a youth recording textbook. The students love seeing each other edit in real time, and they can not "lose" any files. We also use Sketch Up and Picasa for our images, the students stay current on new products with Google Reader, collect our information with Notebook, and of course as the time gets closer you will be able to see our release date on Google Calender.



Ryan York, Teacher
Murfreesboro

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The whole idea of using folders to organize all my emails now sounds absurd. Why spend time organizing when Gmail happily searches and finds everything you are looking for.



Devender, Software Engineer
Phoenix, Arizona

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I have to thank Gmail for helping me graduate from college. As a photography major I spent a lot of time working on large file size photographs and using different computers for editing and printing. It was the night before my final was due, I had about 6 hours left before I had to present my final cut photographs to the class when my flash drive died. Fortunately I had been sending these photographs to my best friend who was studying abroad in Italy. Thanks to Gmail I found that all the photos I had been sending her were perfectly saved and I was able to download them and print them just in time to present them at 8am for my last photography final!



Amber, Artist/Nanny/recent college grad
Orlando, Florida

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Thanks to Gmail, I do not have to sort through the over 3500 spam emails I currently get per month! It used to be that I would receive over 5000 spam emails per month, all of which Gmail caught! I am glad that I use Gmail, because I do not need to worry about my email address being harvested like I did using other services!



Bryan Wyatt, Student
Dallas, Texas

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One of my best friends from High School is over in Iraq right now so we don't get to talk much, but we exchange emails every so often and I keep him informed on whats happening over here and he gives me advice on problems I have... Being able to actually talk to him in real time is something that doesn't happen often, but Gmail gives us an additional opportunity to do so.



Dustin Kulak, Student
La Salle, Texas

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My husband and I met in 2004. He's from Macedonia and I'm from the USA and I'd just gotten my Gmail account. Since then Gmail has been archiving our long-distance relationship from the beginning! It's very sweet to be able to read those messages that we wrote to each other 3 years ago.



Meagan Coleman, Art Student
USA

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I was able to use the chat feature to stay in touch with my brother while he was stationed in Iraq. He's also a Gmail user, so it was great to see him online when I would check my email and be able to hold conversations with him.



Patti Petrone, Business Analyst
Orlando, FL

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I'm a single Dad and I wanted my 5 year old daughter to have some way of keeping a diary of our times together. I created a Gmail account for her and enter journal entries with attached pictures, videos and recordings as well as notes to her when we can't speak. One day I'm going to give her the email address when she is older as a surprise.



Abe Schreiber, Emergency Physician
Englewood, New Jersey

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Gmail is my online post-it note. Whenever I want to remind myself of something or store a bit of important information forever, I send myself a Gmail. I can always find all my Gmail post-it notes by searching.



Bo Moon, Product Manager
Englewood, New Jersey

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Gmail has helped me speed up my daily emailing and is saving me hundreds of hours each year. I have six different email address which before all required six different web mail platforms as I need my email roaming. With Gmail, I have access to all six of my addresses from the same place. No one besides myself knows the difference when sending or receiving emails to or from me.



Andrew Chisholm, Tech Support/Project Manager
Charlottetown

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With Gmail, I am more connected with my family and friends! All of my brothers and sisters (7 in total) are on Gmail and being that we all don't live in the same city this tool has brought us all closer together!



Marisela, Project Managment
Los Angeles

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I used to have an email account with another service, and spam was EVERYWHERE. So when Gmail first came out I made an account. Once I was able to merge my two accounts, nearly 3/4 of the email was automatically taken to the spam folder. The labels helped me stay organized with my new found, and long lost, emails.



Chris McClendon, Student
Georgia

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Gmail has brought it all together. Gmail helps me combine all my school emails to one account, reply messages back with the appropriate email and title, and communicate with thousands of people around the globe without having to save messages on my computer or worry about a crashing server. With the reliability and great features provided by Gmail, I can wake up the next day with a certainty that things will turn out the best.



SooMin Lee, Junior Engineering Student
Northwestern University

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I'm a multimedia student in Dublin and I use Gmail in college with POP to send emails from my college email account. This means I have proof of when I hand in assignments by email (Gmail has saved my life so many times with this!) I also use a separate Gmail account with my teammates, so when we are working on a project we can email our bits to the same account.



Ean, Student
Ireland

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I use my Gmail account to fight the spread of HIV/AIDS. I signed up for Gmail because I wanted to start my own business promoting HIV/AIDS awareness through arts and culture. I'm still struggling to start, but I have been pretty successful.



Chris Conner, Event Planner/Public Relations
Indianapolis

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Around 4 years back I was trying to change job and country. Managing long threads of job applications and their corresponding responses was a real issue, not to mention the heavy email communication with the moving companies, airlines, rental, visas... etc. No other email system could manage all the communications the way I wanted the way Gmail did. Now I work for HP and I live in Dubai. I owe part of that to you.



Faisal Khatib
Dubai

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As a system admin I subscribe to some of the mailing lists for the technology I use (like Samba and Apache). Finding relevant information in the online archives is difficult at best. With this mail in my Gmail archive I can search with Google's powerful search engine to find the relevant information faster.



Darren, Systems Administrator
Edmonton

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I use Gmail to push my company account to my mobile device... I even matched my Gmail account with my company so I can send emails as if I'm sending directly from my company mailbox. So I'm mobile and my company mails are delivered directly to my mobile device on the go. And all I need is a Gmail account.



Sarper Saridal, Wintel Coordinator
Turkey

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My husband recently arrived home from his second tour of duty in Iraq. He's in the Marines and is gone away from home a lot. I checked Gmail probably hundreds of times a day in hopes of hearing from him. Since the computers in Iraq aren't the greatest as far as technology is concerned, the layout of Gmail was easy for him to check periodically, without having to wait for images to load or a bunch of different links to click on. He just logged in and there was an email from me (or twenty, what can I say?) Gmail kept me sane throughout the first deployment. THEN there was the chat feature, which enabled me to see when he was online! During our second deployment, I used Gmail to check back and see when the last time he e-mailed or the last care package I sent arrived, because I had all of our emails archived instead of having to delete them. We would write page long letters, little snippets or jokes, and simple "I love you"'s. Honestly, I can't imagine how much harder the deployments would have been had I not had Gmail to check, because even if I didn't have an email from him, I had Gmail sending me links to news stories right to my inbox about the battalion he was with and the city he was deployed to. Gmail was my crutch throughout our time apart.



Whitney, Housewife
California

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My boyfriend (of 7 years) has been in Iraq for 11 months, 9 days, and 7 hours and I've missed him every second since then. The phones there are often unreliable as they can shut down for days at a time or cross lines. The 8 hour time difference doesn't help much either. The one constant in that time has been our emails through Gmail. Just about every other day I can count on getting an email that makes my day (and sometimes my week!) and the Gmail notifier has been absolutely necessary for me not to stalk my email a million times throughout the work day (so I'm sure my boss will thank you too!) Instead, I get a little pop up telling me that he's safe for one more day (ok it really only says he's emailed me, but that's what it feels like). Gmail has given me something to rely on during his time away and making him feel so much closer even though he's a million miles away.



Lisa, Advertising Sales
New York City

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Gmail has made me more mobile than any mobile phone ever can. Whenever I work on a client site or at home, I will always be at a computer which means I can access my 660 MB large email repository or any of my documents stored in Google Documents... Gmail also cut my chains to a specific ISP and these days I consider ISP related email addresses as a poorly considered option for anyone. In fact I use two ISP's sometimes switching to the backup ISP in which case none of my Google services are affected.



Paul van Dinther, IT Contractor
Waitakere City

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I created a Gmail account for a non-profit agency I've started here in Baltimore, where I help low income families obtain furniture, appliances, clothing, etc. Gmail helps me keep in touch with citizens of Baltimore who know of families in need, so I can get help to them. The storage is phenomenal, and I love the fact that I can search through my mail using keywords. I also love the fact that my workplace doesn't allow chat or instant messaging programs, but I can still use Gmail.



Michelle Ingrodi, Marketing Assistant
Baltimore, Maryland

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I use Gmail to help take votes in a Retro Flick program - old movies being shown in theater again. After watching, people can vote on what they want to see in the theater next. We've already seen Jaws, Indiana Jones: Raiders of the Lost Arc, The Goonies, and Back to the Future. We get more and more each time, and Gmail makes it easy to contact them all and tell them what movie won, and when its going to be in theater for that one night.




Ben Mortensen, Student/Future Soldier
Minnesota, USA

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Someone very special to me lives close, and yet not close enough. While only two hours away, it still makes just hanging out and having fun hard since we both have busy schedules. However, with Gmail, both the emails and the chat, we managed to allow our friendship to grow and blossom. Now I couldn't imagine my life without him, and it never could have happened without Gmail! We would have just ended up decent acquaintances, and that is so very much less than the blessing we have now.



Ashley, Stay at Home Mother
Tunnel Hill, GA

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I am a Resident Adviser at the University of Illinois. Gmail rocks my world when it comes to communicating with the 50 residents on my floor and 11 staff members I work with. With Gmail chat, I can talk to other RA's in my building when asking quick questions and organizing programs. I have Gmail alert me when I get a new email, helping me stay on top of things and make sure issues with residents are handled quickly. Gmail makes things so efficient; it saves me so much time so I can make sure I can spend time studying for my classes and hanging out with friends; it is a multi-tasker's best friend.



Becky Bargfrede, Student
Champaign, IL

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Two years ago I was working for a local ISP. Our biggest problem was the huge volume of spam. No matter what our engineers came up with, we just couldn't find a decent way to handle it all. We created four servers to handle all the mail and still they would get so over loaded that at some times mail would take hours to deliver. Gmail has wowed and amazed me. Even during the holidays, when spam is the worst, I might get one piece a week. That is truly incredible. Had the ISP that I had been working for discovered whatever it is that Gmail engineers found to handle all the junk, my job would have been a lot less stressful. Oh, and yes, I do look every so often to see if I have ever lost a legitimate piece in the Spam section, and I have never found one.



Steven Wood, Retail Store Manager
Richland, WA

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I'm in a fraternity, and like most fraternities we have a list-serve for the entire brotherhood. As you may know, fraternities have their fair share of incidents and "drama". One time there was a controversial incident that happened within the brotherhood and basically the list-serve blew up. Everyone was weighing in and giving their two cents. People were arguing like you wouldn't believe. Those in the fraternity with Gmail all joked about how great it was to be able to have the conversations grouped together so we could keep track!



Jacob Gluck, Student
College Park, MD

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I use Gmail to track potential presents for friends and family. If a friend mentions something they discovered, like a book or a guitar accessory, I star the email and archive it. Then when Christmas or their birthday rolls around, I can quickly find something they would really like. Everyone is always impressed that I remembered that thing they mentioned in brief so long ago.



Sarah, IT
Edmonton

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I'm a working photojournalist and it's so nice to have an email box that I don't have to empty out every week due to the high volume of emails I get. It's easy to keep in contact with editors and since Gmail is POP-enabled, I have all my work email and personal email accessible from the same account. Our work email isn't we-based, so otherwise I would have to travel 15 miles into the office every day to get my email from that particular computer - isn't that ridiculous? The high attachment load is great for sending photo batches to editors - you can't imagine how much that helps in my profession! I can also send photos to myself to retrieve at different newspaper offices. I also love seeing the Spam recipes when I empty out my Spam folder - very cute. It's fantastic to see the program improve day by day.



Iris Smoot, Photojournalist
Simi Valley, CA, US

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I am currently serving in OIF for my second tour. I have a beautiful wife, 4 children and a lot of family all over the place. I can't work effectively without being organized, I guess from being a soldier for six years. Gmail has taken emailing to another level for me. The filters, labels, pictures of everyone that writes me. I also use a feature that allows me to chat with my wife. I enjoy Gmail so much that I have my other email addresses sent straight to my Gmail account. Thanks for creating such a great product and making my deployment and communications with loved ones easier.



Nathan, a Grateful Soldier
Baghdad, Iraq

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My husband is deployed (Army) in Afghanistan and when we can't talk on the phone we email, or I write up drafts for when he does call, so I remember what I wanted to talk to him about. (If I just wrote it down, my 1 1/2 year old daughter would get it somehow and I'd never find it again.) With our previous service, I had to go through hundreds and hundreds of spam mail everyday in order to find emails from my husband. And then my inbox quota would be full and I wouldn't even get my husband's emails. Needless to say my husband and I both have GMAIL now. And ZERO SPAM.



Rachael
USA

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I like to cook and am always saving recipes. I used to type them or copy them into a file and save them on my computer. Then I set up a Gmail account just for recipes and email any recipes I find to the account. I set up labels for all the types of recipes for example chicken, lo fat, lo carb asian. It is then very easy to find recipes and print them out or email them. The best part is that I have access to them from anywhere. If my wife calls me at work and asks (tells) me to make dinner I can quickly print out a recipe and stop to get needed ingredients on the way home. Anytime I try a recipe and it is successful it gets a star.



Dave, Manager
Philly

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I use Gmail for home security. Ever since my home was burgled some months back, I've become more concerned about securing my home or, at the very least, monitoring my home when I'm not there. Using an old laptop in conjunction with some video capture software and Gmail, I have a system set up which sends emails containing surveillance snapshots of my home to my Gmail account. If the laptop itself is stolen, no problem, Gmail's redundant architecture has given me no issues, and ensures that a copy of whatever motion was detected is in a safe data repository that I can access should another burglar come to call. It's nice enough to be able to take a look at my home from anywhere on the web, but to view live snapshots I've sent to my Gmail account of intruders is even better.



Alan, Software developer / IT consultant
Gainesville, Florida

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Gmail's spam detection is top notch. My email address is displayed across many websites including my own, which holds a 20+ thousand member registration, and still I don't receive nearly much spam in my inbox as I do with other accounts.



David Singh, Web Designer
New York

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Gmail's spam detection is top notch. My email address is displayed across many websites including my own, which holds a 20+ thousand member registration, and still I don't receive nearly much spam in my inbox as I do with other accounts.



David Singh, Web Designer
New York

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I used Gmail to create a recurring task reminder. I run a small department and schedule regular and irregular tasks in a special Google calendar account used only for this purpose. I set up a reminder to go out 30 minutes before an event. When the calendar sends the reminder to the corresponding Gmail account it hits a filter that looks for "[Reminder]" and forwards it to an email alias at my workplace which in turn forwards that reminder to my whole group. This way floors get mopped, air filters get changed and we stay ahead of the curve without me having to be a picky boss or keep it all in my head. Best part: I only had to think of all of the tasks once and the solution is automated!



Doug Geiger, Business Consultant
Detroit, MI

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I created a personal knowledge base with Gmail. It's really just a second email account (same as my main account but with a ".kb" at the end) which I send emails to in a specific format that I want to use as reference. The labels allow me to browse and obviously searching is a snap. I have to "hack" things a little by keeping all of the articles unread so that I know how many I have in each category. I used blogger to explain the whole thing in greater detail: http://p2pkb.blogspot.com



Doug Geiger, Business Consultant
Detroit, MI

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I switched to Gmail because I didn't appreciate all the ads on that would pop up with other services. Not only did I not want to see that all the time... it also got uncomfortable to check my personal email at work.



Summer, Insurance Customer Service
Green Bay, WI

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Who doesn't love that Gmail has the best spam filter around?! No need to scan through the crap I want to avoid in the first place. Gmail always keeps me straight in this hectic world.



Alexis,
Santa Fe, New Mexico

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I am the VP of membership for the Hyderabad Toastmasters...one of the many Toastmasters clubs all over the world. As vice prez membership, I send group mail to the club members, and have to be accessible to even strangers... Gmail helps weed out spam from the tons of mail I get. I also use Gmail labels to store info online, stuff like member FAQs and so on, which I can grab at a moments notice!



Avs Prasad, Doctor
Hyderabad, India

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I have tried other email servers, and none of them have such quick responses as Gmail! Gmail sends my emails instantly, and my friends get them within seconds... I also love using it to email people, and to keep in touch with my best friends from college. I have my Gmail notification on whenever my computer is on, allowing me to keep my promise - to reply all emails within 10 minutes when I am at home!



Sai, Student
UK

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I am too cheap to buy a flash drive for school. But this Gmail account is so awesome and it has so much available space that it allows me to email my lengthy reports to myself. I then can access those files from anywhere and print them out from my University. I survived on this method for 4 and a half years now. I even use the account as a picture storage so I can see what pictures I have sent to my friends. I really enjoy my access anywhere flash drive.



Vick Katoch, Student
Saint Louis

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After I got a Gmail account I decided to set up an account for my new-born son. I have been sending him emails telling him things like, if has reached a milestone (eating solids, walking etc.) or just things like today we went to the zoo, or sending him photos - basically keeping an online journal. When he grows up I will hand him his email account and he can go back and see all these emails. I have done the same for my 2nd son.



Faiz Ahmad, Engineer
Michigan USA

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A few months ago I got a Gmail account for my own personal use. That may sound common but as a mother to 5 , 4 of which are disabled , 3 of which have a form of Autism , having my own email account that doesn't contain emails from schools and doctors etc was so refreshing. Now I have found that the way Gmail works would help me to keep up with all the emails from the doctors, schools etc. I didn't want to give up my personal account so tonight I opened an account for the business side of running my family.



Dana, Domestic Goddess
Vermont

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A long time ago, one of my best friends from college told me she was planning to write a book about her adventures (there have been many). When I checked on her progress a few years back, she said that she's too lazy to write, despite having many exciting experiences traveling the world as a yoga teacher. I jokingly suggested that she buy a digital recorder, talk into it and send me the files, and I'd compile her stories into a book. Apparently it wasn't such a joke, because for the last two years I've been receiving these sound files into my Gmail account. Every other mailbox was too small to handle the large files, but not Gmail! Now, not only am I able to hear my friend's voice from around the world, but someday when all these tales become a fabulous book, we'll have Gmail to thank!



Jenn Veilleux, Grad Student
Chicago, IL

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I use my Gmail for casting auditions. We have had a great response with over 2,000 emails. We are currently on YouTube and created the first super hero for Australia. We are creating a pilot for c31 as we have been given the green light to do so - and are using Gmail for organizing auditions.



Gallijess, Film maker

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Gmail is helping us to document the history of our family. When each child is born, I create a Gmail account & begin to email them things that I see & things they do when they're young. When they are old enough to read, they can use their Gmail account & begin by reading their life history in the form of emails.



Randy Fife, Financial Services Manager
Wisconsin

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Shaun, my best friend since fourth grade just moved to Africa! He joined the Peace Corp this fall and is currently stationed in Mettu, Ethiopia. I have used Gmail to keep in touch, send pictures, and share the latest news in our Fantasy Football League. Shaun has been moving around the country so traditional mail is unreliable and takes a long time to reach him. Gmail has allowed our friendship to stay connected.



Stephen Chapoton, Sales
Toledo, OH

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I find the Gmail web application amazingly useful as a student. I have organized my classes into filters and labels to avoid my inbox from getting cramped by all the "e-savvy" teachers. I could never ignore so many deadlines/teachers/class notes without your filters! One thing I truly love is the Gmail application for cellphones. I love to open up my phone late at night (time difference is mean) and check and see if the wonderously cute Japanese girl has replied to my email. Then I sit and type in Japanese back which is really good for practicing fluency! If, say in the middle of one of my longer drafts with a huge chunk of japanese my phone dies I can rest assure that Gmail has already saved what I wrote into a draft.



Matt Howard, Student
California

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I like Gmail because it's a great way to keep in touch with old friends and maintain a relationship. I have a girlfriend that moved to Portland yesterday and my heart was broken but I got a Gmail account and now I'm going to visit her!



Quillan
Olympia, Washington

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I have started using Gmail to write a daily journal. I write all the journals with a specific subject and send it to myself. I have a filter setup for it, which marks it read, moves out of the inbox and adds a colored label. I just love it. It really fills up the need for an Online Journal that I have always been looking for. I know you guys will keep it safe and sound.



Nithin, Software Engineer
Bangalore, India

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About 3 years ago I went on student exchange to Japan and fell in love with a girl at an exchange school. I then used Gmail to send emails to her mobile, roughly 3 a day for the past three years. The total number of email sent is 1147. In 6 months I'm moving to Japan to become a teacher of English as a second language, and I'll see her again. It's basically through Gmail that the whole relationship has continued.



Chris Flinn, Student
Sydney

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We have been using Gmail for the past 2 years. We tried many different applications including our own hosting mail server and exchange, but nothing came even close to the functionality and stability of Gmail. One of our big problems was the ever increasing spam to our employees and customers. With Gmail's excellent success rate to trap spam, we are now confident again in using our email for our business life... we can now concentrate on growing our business and increasing sales instead of monitoring and maintaining our email servers. We encourage all our staff to actively use Google Email, Chat, Calendar and Document sharing as it brings our little community even closer.



Chris Mather, IT Productions
Melbourne, Australia

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Gmail for me is the best email could someone have. It has anything I have done - like chat logs, pictures, and videos of my life since I started using it. It's easy and fast it just has everything.



Mohamad, Internet provider
Africa

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I've been using Gmail for a long time. One day I opened my email and I found an email from an unknown sender. I read the email and realized the writer meant to reach someone else, so I wrote her back and after few weeks of chatting we met. I dated this girl for 4 month and all thanks to Gmail.



Lior, Student
Israel

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My best friend lives over a thousand miles away and Gmail has kept us best of friends. It is incredibly reliable, and yet it's free! No other email provider I have used has been as reliable as this. And the complete lack of image adverts is fantastic. Everything is simple, and if I don't know how to do something, then I can quickly find out how when I search through the Help Center!



Sam Knight, Student
UK

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I heart Gmail a TON!!! I can easily email my friends that live close by...and keep in touch with my brother who lives in Cali, and my friends in NY! It is so EASY and it's practical.



Chloe Pool

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With Gmail - sorting mail has never been easier. You have kept it simple and easy to use for users like me. It has helped me managed my emails better. Whether it's business transactions, letters or personal - being able to search out mail is great. Not deleting it is super awesome.



Aaron Ang, Degree Student
Malaysia, Kuching, Sarawak

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...Gmail helps me by overcoming unwanted emails, viruses or any malicious scripts, just by blocking them before they start executing...



Sikandar Ahmed, Helpdesk Analyst
Hyderabad

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I have been using Gmail faithfully since 2005 and cannot imagine going back to any other "free-mail" options. Gmail is versatile -- it allows me to create as many labels as I want, it categorizes my emails for me, and gives me options on how I want to view attachments. No other application does that. And once I started discovering the additional features like Google Docs, I was able to store and share important spreadsheets, presentations, and documents with ease.



Andree Robinson Neal, University Administrator
Southern California

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My younger brother and I have always been incredibly close. We shared a lot of the same friends in high school and he even took my best friend to the prom one year. Unfortunately, employment led him to Austin, TX, and I remained in Pennsylvania. Seeing him once a year became the norm. I never realized just how lonely I would be without the daily conversations we shared. Then he invited me to join Gmail - and we talk almost daily, and have for the past 3 years. We've shared emails, chats, phone calls - all through Gmail. I actually got my brother back again!



Danielle Miller, Museum Educator
Johnstown, PA, USA

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I use Gmail (along with the whole web suite including Docs etc) to organize, communicate and document my non-profit Injured Worker Advocacy group. This has helped us help many people and without your free web services I don't believe it would have been possible - at least not on this scale! Thanks Gmail - you really do make people's lives better by allowing us to defend their rights much easier!



SG, Injured Worker Advocate
Canada

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Gmail is simple and quick. It has enabled me to consolidate my mail, my chat, my documents, and so many other things that I access throughout the day. It is one place for communication, storage, and research: all vital for college students. I am so glad I made the switch.



Caresse Fossey, Student
New York in body, Oregon at heart

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I met Gmail about 3 years ago...a friend from Taiwan gave me an invitation and all my problems related to spam, email coordination, organization, and so on, disappeared. In my group of friends I was the first one to get a Gmail account...Gmail was "the" novelty in Argentina! I've found Gmail to be an excellent instrument for the day to day. I chat with my friends who lives far away, I email to friends like chatting... I check it like 20 times a day! I cannot imagine my life without it.



Lida, Economist
Buenos Aires, Argentina

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Basically I am just your average teen but I can honestly say I have never found anything better than Gmail! I love how it can tell what is spam without me having to tell it. And I love how the emails are set up. No more scrolling so much!! And chat on the page?! GENIUS! Gmail made it possible for me to chat with my friends that could not download messengers.



Miry

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...With Gmail, I can search through thousands of emails to find that one that has the word "wade" in it from back in 2005. It has allowed me to keep chatting with my fiance and father of my son while working the friendly skies. That in itself has saved me hundreds of dollars, if not more, in phone bills when I'm in Canada. And never mind Mexico, my phone doesn't even work there! Gmail, a free service, has saved me hundreds, even thousands, of dollars. I enjoy the news stories, funny quotes, and spam recipes that appear when I'm going through my mail. I get a huge laugh out of some of the adds that show up when my friend has told me a joke about a raccoon...funny stuff.



Hoolahoop Max, Flight Attendant
Ohio, and the friendly skies

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At the Scottsdale Public Library, we teach introductory computer classes, including email. We use Gmail as the example for the class. I have taught 3 classes so far and they have been fantastic. Gmail is easy to sign up for, and with our 2 hour classes, there is usually time (after we show the labels, compose, reply and forward features) to visit Google Maps where the students can see their house.



Richard Glady, Library Assistant
Scottsdale, AZ

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Never being a fan of web-based email I initially began using Gmail as a repository for junk email. Impressed with it's spam filter reliability I began using it all the time. We all know the headache of configuring spam filters in desktop email clients. People only want their email. Gmail is what you'd expect to get out of web-based email. The others simply cannot compete and behave like they're still designed for 1995.



Beau Hastings
USA

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I'm the sort of person who really loves and cares about nostalgic feelings, which means I really love pouring over things I myself did a while ago. Reading emails joined my list of those things after I started using Gmail February '05. I haven't deleted one single mail in my inbox until now and I've no plans of doing it in the future. As time passes on, we keep improving. I use Gmail as a gauge to see how much I've managed to improve my written communication skills and that's fantastic!



Sriram Sridharan, Student
Tamil Nadu, India

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I am an in-home child care provider. I do love my job and the infants and toddlers I care for, but this job can leave you isolated. I'm so deprived of adult conversation. So I use Gmail to connect with other providers. We have 'conversations' during the day, especially at nap time. It's so nice to have a way to ask a question and have a 'co-worker' help you with the answer. We support and encourage each other.



Pamm, Home Child Care Provider
Arizona

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I use Gmail also to store important files that I might need on the go, taking advantage of the huge space available!



Ivan Cardenas, R&D Pharmaceutics
Quito, Ecuador

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I volunteer extensively for a Cairn Terrier rescue group. We are the largest single breed dog rescue in North America rescuing, rehabilitating and re-homing almost 400 Cairn Terriers each year. Part of this work entails a VERY busy list-serve with often 4,000-6,000 messages monthly. Many of these messages contain attachments and pictures. Without Gmail, managing the amount of mail generated by this group would be just about impossible... By using Gmail with its threading and huge storage, not only can we now manage to more quickly read the posts (and easily delete whole threads) but we can archive them and then find what we want in a flash with the search feature.


One of my volunteer jobs is to create our yearly calendar which has over 500 pictures in it and takes enormous planning. With Gmail, I opened a separate account just for pictures that come as attachments in the above mentioned listserve. I can now just forward the messages and later, when I need a picture, using the search feature, I can easily find all the ones I need so I can choose the best picture of any particular dog to use in the calendar. I often have over a dozen to chose from. With the storage Gmail gives me, I never worry about running out of space and I do not have to be at my home computer when I'm working on the calendar. I can just search from any computer, find what I want and then either star it or label it and when I get home to my calendar making program, I have some work already done. It has made my life so much easier.



Kkrpsyd, Psychologist
New York

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I am constantly overwhelmed by the amount of STUFF I have to keep track of, and Gmail has helped so much with that. Last year my son forwarded me an important official email and then yesterday, when he needed it, he couldn't find it. I did a quick search on MY email, and there it was. Likewise when someone claimed my husband had made a statement (untrue!) I just clicked a few times on my mouse, and there was his letter in its entirety. Thank you for making a little order in the Chaos.



Mimi, Technician
Pacific Northwest

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When I first got Gmail, it seemed like any other email program; it receives emails and it sends them. But once I started telling my friends about my new email address and the mail started to flood in, I realized I could keep up with the email so much faster using Gmail. Some more of my friends got Gmail accounts, and we started long heated debates over politics, religion, and life ethics. We extended the conversations to our friends using other services, but they were always six or eight emails behind us. They just couldn't keep up.



Graham, Student
Greensboro, NC

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My fiance and I have been in a long distance relationship for four years now, but it was not only until 2006 that we found about about Gmail. He is in an immigrant in the US, and I am left here in the Philippines. Tough times came when he had to be deployed to Iraq for 6 months! It was hard for us because his phone calls are very limited. We had to rely on an email service so that we could still constantly be in touch. That was when he told me to get a Gmail account. We are so happy with the service! We get our emails in real time and Gmail is very user friendly. Gmail was one of the ways that helped us to stay together during the deployment.



Apples Dais, Registered Nurse
Philippines

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I was stranded at Squaw on Saturday with a new phone - with none of my contacts. Fortunately I was able to use Gmail's search function to find my friend's number, just by searching for his last name and pulling up an old email with his phone number. It was so easy to find an email that was 9 months old and the unique piece of information I needed - my buddy Nick's phone number. My N95 also highlighted the phone number in the email making it even easier to call Nick once I had the number, which reflects the strong design of Gmail's download application.



Gabe, kyte: TV Out of the Box
San Francisco, CA

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I am a high school student trying to start a video business, while at the same time running my own social networking site. I use Gmail to stay in constant contact with my admins and users. Because I get a ton of email from the network, I use Gmail to sort it out for me. Being able to use one inbox is the best thing, because even though I only use one inbox, I have 3 accounts that I am able to check regularly without having to keep signing in and out. Thanks for making my life a little bit easier.



Matthew Brian, Webmaster/ Highschool Student
Florida

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2004 was a special year. On September 5th of that year, Arbit Choudhury- The World's 1st MBA Comic Character (www.arbitmba.com) was born - created by me and Hemant, my MBA batchmate at the time. After "Arbit Choudhury" was an instant hit with the masses in India, we were in a peculiar quandary. Soon we would be graduating from our B-school to start our professional careers in different geographies across the globe. How would we be able to continue to create Arbit Choudhury comic strips on a regular basis, while working half way across the world? It did not take us long to figure out the answer. It was Gmail and it's associated services.


Over the last 3 years, Google has helped me, Hemant and Nikhil seamlessly co-ordinate and synchronize our activities from different parts of the world. We have continuously created and released Arbit Choudhury comic strips from 12 cities (Geneva, London, Kualalumpur, Dubai, Baltimore, Hyderabad, Bangalore, Mumbai, Chennai, Bilaspur, Baroda, Bhopal), 6 countries (India, USA, UK, Switzerland, UAE, Malaysia) and 3 continents (Asia, Europe and North America). Archiving truckloads of fan mails on Gmail, arranging important mails through multiple labels, discussing plans on Gmail Chat, scheduling activities on Google Calender, simultaneously working on documents on Google Docs; Gmail has been the driving force that has helped the 3 of us take Arbit Choudhury to his fans over the last 3 years. The extent of our dependence on Gmail and it's related services is best summed up by Hemant, when he says, that our days begin with "Google before Gargle".



Shubham Choudhury, Cartoonist
Hyderabad, India

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This past spring when my dad died, my family used Gmail and Google Docs to collectively write his obituary. Everyone got to put in his/her 2 cents and edit to make the information clearer. While not an earth shattering use of Gmail, it ended up introducing several members of the family to this technology.



Kristen Sohlberg, University instructor
Missoula, Montana

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My niece, my sister's step daughter, had moved to CO 3 years ago and I had only seen her once in that time. I missed her. Shortly after I signed up with Gmail...I was on the phone one day with my sister, and my niece. My niece said she had started liking computers and thought it was "sooo cool" how fast I am able to type. One thing led to the next, and we were able to chat using Gmail a couple of times. I felt a closer connection with her being able to get on and chat. In late May '07, I'm happy to say, they all moved back to CA!



Liz Ebersole, Admin. Assistant & Full-Time Aunt!
Pleasanton, CA

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My brother-in-law has been talking to me about Gmail for 2-3 years now, as he and his wife (my sister) have been using it... I was sick of the spam with my other email accounts. Finally in March of 2007, just for spam reasons alone, I decided to give Gmail a try. I haven't stopped using Gmail and I have even created a couple of additional accounts. I won't ever go back. I have had way less spam using Gmail and I am happy with Gmail services...



Liz Ebersole, Admin. Assistant & Full-Time Aunt
Pleasanton, CA

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The ability to search within Gmail has allowed me to be free from the mass-directory-izing of my previous email client. Now I just dump it all into the archive and know that with a single search string I can get what I need. It's been a life saver for recalling event details, client info, family commitments and more. I often reply to myself just to add a piece of info I want to have for later, like a sticky note.



Terry Cokenour, Web Designer
Houston, TX, US

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We use Gmail successfully for our neighborhood watch group. Our South Central Troy neighborhood is connected with our police department, Mayor's office and DPW. We have over 300 members and we send out notices regarding safety issues. By using alerts, we have thwarted scam artists, notified neighbors about wanted suspects and given everyone a sense of community. Thanks Gmail for helping us clean up our 'hood.



Heather Hamlin, South Central Troy Neighborhood Watch Chairperson
Troy, NY

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I briefly dated a guy in high school. The relationship ended amicably, and we both moved on with our lives. Ten years passed, and I had finally decided what I wanted a degree in, and so I was planning to go back to college. Soon after, I got an email from the boy I had dated a decade previously. He had Googled me! He was a grad student, and was wondering how I was doing etc. Through emails and chatting, we became close, and after a few months he drove to my house, picked up me and all of my possessions, and moved me to his house. I started school that fall.



Erika, Student
Fargo, ND

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My mother just turned 50 this year. For the past 23 years, she has struggled with a debilitating neurological condition that prevents her from working in her chosen field -- journalism. The last time she actively worked as an active member of the media was in the early 1980s. Needless to say, things have changed a bit. Her rare condition, dubbed cerebellar degeneration, also somewhat limits her ability to adapt to new tenets of day-to-day living, particularly new technology. She grew to hate anything relating to computers and developed a strong resistance to society's increasingly Internet-dependent way of life. Though she'd been out of the industry for so long, she needed to write. She needed to feel that she was still able to use her talents as a reporter, which her disease couldn't take from her. And to do that, she needed to learn what email was and how it could get her words in print. After weeks of daily practice, my mother began to feel comfortable using a mouse, locating a web browser, making her way to Gmail, examining her inbox, learning the anatomy of a window, discerning between read and unread mail, and performing many other functions that most of us take for granted... Gmail is uncluttered and simple. It's doable for her, and day by day, her computer literacy increases. The process isn't easy, as her manual dexterity provides daily obstacles. However, after about two months of drilling and learning new vocabulary, she succeeded in sending two feature stories to the editor of our local paper. It was a big step for her, as it had been a while since she was last published. She sent the editor the attachments, as journalistic protocol goes these days. And only Mom and I know the struggle, the two-hour phone conversations, the three-hour private lessons, that yielded those brief, but victorious exchanges.



K, PR and Marketing Manager
New Jersey

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My three friends and I have been using Gmail to stay in touch. We have been in several different locations California, Rhode Island, Ohio, Texas, Oxford England and Langley, BC and rarely at the same place at the same time. Since Gmail saves our conversations I now have over 715 conversations with just one friend alone, and it is our main means of communication. And because there is enough space to store all of these conversations, we now have hundreds of thousands of lines of text from which to write our memories from.



Sarah M Roberts, Professional Organizer
Aurora, TX

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Almost 2.5 years ago, over Gmail I was complaining to my boyfriend (now my husband) about a terribly painful canker sore I had. Predictably, I got a bunch of "canker sore remedy" context ads... One led to a page about detergent free toothpaste, along with links to the four clinical studies showing that detergent caused people to have more and worse canker sores. I haven't used detergent in my mouth since then, and I've only had about 2-3 small canker sores a year since, as opposed to the 2-3 often large ones I'd have each month before.



Laura, Technical Support
Madison, WI

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With my previous email, I was constantly annoyed by the HUGE flash ads popping up everywhere. It was also horribly annoying to organize everything... I heard about Gmail though my dad who reads so many RSS feeds that my mom and I are flabbergasted at how he gets anything else done... Finally I got an account. Suddenly all of my email was easily organized and the ads just vanished into text, which I rarely noticed and was actually useful when I saw it. When chat was added to Gmail it gave me an easy way to quickly contact all my friends without having to pay for the phone or sending a ton of email with just a few words. And with all the other organizational services Google offers like Calendar, my family is more organized than it ever has been.



Nathaniel, Student
California

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I love Gmail because before I would receive tons and tons of spam messages when using those other email providers. I also love Gmail because there are no crazy banners and ridiculous
adds taking up over half of the page. It has made my life simpler.



Ronald Hoskins, Youth Minister
Portland, OR

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Just over one year ago, I met my husband online. I was in Boston, he was in Orange County, CA. After a few days of sending messages via the e-matchmaker, we began emailing. I had recently opened my Gmail account. The correspondence was delightful, and because Gmail threads email conversations together and features Google to search through the entire account, when it was time, after the wedding, to print out our love letters for posterity, the whole process was a snap!



Alice Gallagher, Clarinetist
San Clemente, CA

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Gmail is fantastic. It makes finding emails from professors a breeze (just search their name!), and tagging important bulletins with a star makes everything even easier. Plus, being able to apply labels (sorting through my mail is a hassle) makes it easy to tell if I have any important email when I only have a few minutes to check it. And finally, being able to send and receive email FROM my campus webmail is awesome - no longer am I a slave to the poor interface that is SFU webmail!



James Plett, Student
Surrey, BC, Canada

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I just wanted to tell you that Gmail made email useful and fun again. From the time I received my Gmail invite, it brought email back to life for me. And then your integration with chat was absolutely brilliant -- especially the storing of the chats as searchable from within Gmail.



Yitz, Web Developer
Israel

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When I became engaged there was a lack of support for my marriage because it wasn't arranged. Gmail was the first place I was able to use my new name and really relish my impending matrimony. It was the point in my life where I took ownership of my new identity and let go of everyone's expectations, except my own. Thank you for making free email personal again.



Liz, Medical Student
Michigan

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I really like Gmail because it's a place where you can just talk to your friends and have fun. I believe it's a great idea for adults all the way to children.



Emily
Warren, PA

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I moved to the States 4 years ago. I came as a tourist, but I found my wife so I had to stay. 3 months ago my freind back home in Denmark told me to switch to Gmail, he is in computer technology and development so I trust him. Now I am in much more and much faster contact with my friends and family back home. I had not realized how little contact we had until now that I changed to Gmail and almost write on a daily basis. Thanks for making it easy, nice and simple.



Thomas, Arborrist
Washington State

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I first discovered Gmail right before I went to Iraq. While I was in Iraq it turned out that you couldn't check your email on most computers, but I found a way to check my Gmail and it was the only one that would work. Then chat came out, and that was one of the greatest days because until then I had to write emails back and forth due to the fact that Instant Messaging was not allowed but then the chat was created, so it was easy to keep in touch. It was like having somewhat of a more realistic conversation so that made things a whole lot easier. Now I am in Okinawa Japan and Gmail with AIM has been added and wow it makes it that much greater because some computers on Base do not have AIM installed on them but now I can text my Fiancee's phone using AIM on Gmail to keep in touch while she is not logged into Gmail. I recommend everyone switch to Gmail.



Adrian A Alviar, U.S. Marine
Okinawa, Japan

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I was on an expedition cruise in Antarctica last week, standing at the bow of the MS Fram, when I noticed a life preserver ring floating near an iceberg. I alerted the crew, and we stopped and sent a rescue boat to retrieve it. The ring turned out to be from the MS Explorer, which recently sank about 30 miles from our location. I took photos of the ring floating in the water and of the retrieval and of myself posing with it and some crew members who formerly served on the Explorer. Using one of the ship's computers with satellite access, I used my Gmail account to transmit three photos and text to timesunion.com, the Website of the Albany, NY, newspaper, where I work. The Web staff posted the story and photos in their travel blog, and the story was online throughout the world just a few hours after it happened. Gmail helped me get out the story quickly and keep in touch with friends while cruising at the very bottom of the world.



Paul Block, Novelist and Journalist
Albany, NY

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I was working on a huge report for English class and it didn't transfer to my flash drive. Then I remembered that I had copied it to Gmail chat and sent it to a friend. As quickly as I could, I typed a small portion of the paper into the search and bam! I had enough time to print it and turn it in... To tell the truth, Gmail is more of a necessity to life than an email client.



John Venzon, Student
Corpus Christi, Texas

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Going through preteen and early teen years can be a real struggle without a great socializing tool. Gmail has been this for me. I have archived messages from a long time ago, making it easy to look over memories and laugh about things that happened. The chat feature has been a life saver, too. If I need someone to talk to or help or anything, I know I can get it with just one click. Going through middle school makes it terribly hard to stay in touch with your friends without Gmail. I can also brag about the fact the I almost never get any spam, which makes life a whole lot easier and a whole lot less annoying. The picture feature has made it easy to flaunt current interests and communicate with a crush that I'm never going to get.



Elayne, Middle School Student
Indiana

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I have been living in the US for about two years now, and hadn't talked to my Dad for about a year and a half. We had almost lost complete touch for that time until I discovered that he also had a Gmail account, because he appeared as one of my contacts in my contact list. My Dad is not very computer savvy, so he knows nothing about chatting programs. He does know his email though, and he had no clue about the chat tool on Gmail. Not until I sent him a message. We were both really glad, and now we talk regularly through Gmail chat.



Patrick McGauran, Student/Calendar Assistant at the DA's Office
Martinez, California

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Gmail has helped me tremendously in closing the gap between me and my relatives from Ohio. I have never seen them in person, and only got to communicate with them a few times when I was younger. They all thought they would never hear from my family again. Then about a year ago, I made contact, by sending Christmas cards to the addresses from the old letters they sent and hoped for the best that they didn't move (after over a decade of no communication). In about a month's time I was surprised they emailed me on Gmail! My uncle does not delete any of my emails, and we chat when we can, setting up a concrete schedule to eliminate the time difference issue. It is expensive for our families to visit each other, but Gmail has made it easier for us to feel close to one another. Thank God for technology! I am happy that we have grown much closer, and although I may be "foreign" to them (all of my dad's siblings and their families live in Ohio and I grew up in a different cultural setting), I do not feel that I am the odd one out because they are so very near and dear to my heart.



Angela Ickes, Masters Student
Philippines

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Gmail spam filters are incredible! You don't know how much it means to me to not have to wade through piles of nonsense just to get to my emails. You make my life just that much better everyday!



Joy, Grad Student
NYC

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Gmail allowed my (at the time) super shy boyfriend to ask me out through the chat function. A year and a half later we have graduated high school and gone to university and we're still using Gmail to keep in touch! :)



Kaelyn, Front Desk Clerk
B.C., Canada

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I'm a senior in high school and the class I have the hardest time with is Economics. Lucky for me, I have Gmail. My class was part of a state-wide program called "The Stock Market Simulation". We had a lot of research to do and we had to keep a close watch on stocks we were invested in. Gmail helped me because I could email myself the documents I needed and I knew they would be delivered safely. Combined with amazing Google Finance, looking up stocks has never been easier and all the information I ever needed was right there on the page. Having Google and Gmail has made my Economics project much easier. All your hard work and my hard work put together gave me the grade I was hoping for!



Tiffany Cantara, Retail
Cape Neddick, ME

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My fiance and I have used Gmail to help his son recover. Stuck in the ICU for weeks after a life threatening injury is not the best way for a 12 year old to spend Thanksgiving and Christmas. We set up a Gmail account for him so that his friends, who live too far away to come visit him in the hospital, can talk to him, and keep his spirits up until he is well enough to go home. Even his teachers have given the email out in school, so that classmates can communicate with him and make sure he remains a part of the class while he's gone.



Jennifer, Program Director
Richmond, VA

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I lost an auction for a hard-to-find DVD that went over my 50 dollar bid. Then, in Gmail, I saw an advertisement for the DVD on my Inbox screen, and I was able to buy the DVD as a gift for under 25 dollars!



Jeremiah, Analyst
Kansas

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I used to have the problem of having to keep getting letters from websites I signed up for, but since I got Gmail, I am able to place those email into a separate folder, making my life easier.



Julie, Student
New York

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I usually check Gmail on my laptop, but every once in a while I like to download all my email back to my main desktop computer. Since I get a lot of email, and I did this maybe once a month, this usually involved going through 200ish emails, from four different email accounts. (1 Gmail, 2 Google Apps, and 1 from my ISP). I had never used IMAP before, so I decided to give it a try. It worked fantastically. I no longer have to go through 200 emails to make sure I've read all of them when I go back to my desktop. Even better, it saves space by only downloading the emails I need. After my great experience with IMAP, I wanted to use it for my ISP email. But, no such luck; they don't offer it. The free email service from Gmail outperforms the email service I pay for.



Glenn Rivkees, Student; Google Desktop Gadget Developer and API Guru
Florida

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I'm a pilot flying a private jet for VIP's, movie stars and others. I have a company Blackberry and a personal cell phone/PDA with Gmail set up. Can't get caught up in spam, so this works well in the mobile world.



Larry Cheshire, Pilot
Tampa, FL

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I am a student at The University of Alabama and I love Gmail. While working on a group project that was 30% of my grade one of my group members forgot to save the project the night before it was due. Luckily I had Gmail to recover the outline that was sent in an email. So my group and I worked on the project via Gmail chat, asking for figures and to keep everyone in the loop. I love that AIM is integrated into Gmail chat, so I have my main communication tools in one!



Allison, Student
Alabama

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My current career is stressful, so why should managing email be? I work a 9 - 5 day when my best girlfriend who currently lives in China also works 9-5pm in her time and country. Both of us can forget things during our short conversation. Thankfully, Gmail has such great features that allow me to just email myself and archive the message and then retrieve it instantly instead of using search strings or fishing through 100 emails. Don't get me wrong, Gmail also has a good search feature which is very useful and that is why I love Gmail so much. With Gmail, I will never lose a phone number, or a special comment. It's a very good user interface with a sure way to keep track of any word, phrase or even numbers and addresses or whatever else is important to you, so that you do not lose contact with a loved person out of reach. I also loved the integrated chat and how it uses virtually no system memory.


If it were not for Gmail, my girlfriend in China would have lost contact with me. The system is very good for people who are organized and/or those who is not as organized as they come and tend to lose information, can store everything inside Gmail and find it easily.



Michael Meadors, Customer Service
Chicago, Illinois

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Recently I logged into Gmail to find that there was a new Group Chat option available. "Group Chat?!" I thought. I tested it out with a friend and it worked great... But how many people could fit into a single chat? We immediately set out on a goal of trying to get 100 people in a single chat. We quickly realized that this would be very hard. So we changed our goal to fifty people. Each person who joined the chat was encouraged to fire off invitations to all their friends. 802 lines of chat later (and an extremely complicated conversation that was near impossible to follow) we succeeded in bringing 51 people in the single chat at a single time. Upon surpassing the goal of 50, the group chat cheered with rapid consecutive congratulations and then... suddenly, there was a mass exodus. Gmail is rockin'.



Mike D., Mechanical Engineer
Meriden, CT

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We use Gmail to send newspaper adverts and other advert-based media to clients. It's a great service - comprising of both speed and ease of use.



GAA Artroom, Advertising Company
Guyana

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Gmail has allowed better communication with my cheerleading teams and their parents. Prior to becoming the Coach of two large squads, the parents were screaming for better communication. I chose Gmail because of its easy to use format and great spam filters. I am able to set up groups and update families weekly as well as daily communications. I also utilize the calendar feature and keep both teams schedules coordinated. The parents love receiving the communications and updates. I am able to access my account even when I am on my monthly business trips, so the girls don't ever "miss" me.



Coach Laura, Coach/ HR Executive
Burlingame, CA

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Recently I suffered an accident to my knee which kept me immobilized for weeks. I was stuck with no computer in reach, but a lot of work to do. Thanks to Gmail on my mobile phone I was able to attend to my work on a daily basis and even managed to setup a small Diabetes course. I'm now back to work and thanks to Gmail I did not miss much of the action.



Rikaz Sheriff, Medical Doctor
Sri Lanka

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I've been so bummed at work, sitting at my desk all day, when I find myself completed with all of my tasks and have nothing else to do. Obviously, we have filters that block certain sites from being viewed. But, the release of AIM chat within Gmail is life changing. When I think there is no hope to completing my day, I simply go to Gmail and see what friends are online. A simple "hey, what's up" from a bud makes the day all the better. Keep rocking. \m/



Shane, Finance (hopefully music, soon)
Detroit, MI

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Gmail has made traveling internationally error and trouble free... With other free email services, content and functions are limited by what country you access the service in. This is not the case with Gmail, so I can feel like I am at home or in my office anywhere worldwide. Gmail offers a global service so dedicated to all walks of life.



Richard Fehr, Business Owner
Edmonton, Alberta, Canada

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Gmail saved me more than $12,000 last year. In an unfortunate situation, I was wrongly accused of NOT disclosing information upon the sale of my home. Luckily, with Gmail's generous hard drive space, search functionality and "crash proof" back-up servers, I was able to retrieve an email in moments, where the buyer's thanked me for providing the information they later accused me of hiding.



Eric, USA

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I am using Gmail to keep a journal of my life and thoughts for my NOW 7 year old daughter who does not have access to a PC, and incidentally we have been apart for over a year and have had very little contact. So I email her on a daily basis and I have given the username and password to someone special in a sealed envelope, when she turns 18 or if anything should happen to me she will deliver the envelope to my daughter and hopefully she will login and be able to read and reflect on everything I've emailed her.



Mike, IT
New York

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Since I got into computers and technology I've been digging through all kinds of sites and signing up with my Gmail account... When I get spam messages they never go to my inbox, they always go to the spam folder. On other email accounts I get thousands and thousands of spams into my inbox folder and the filters don't work right.



Emir Al-Kafagi, Student
Skopje

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I first started with Gmail when I was a full time volunteer with Soldiers' Angels. I had been given the opportunity to email with deployed troops to see if they would like someone to email with while they were deployed. At one point I was sending out over 500 emails a day and no other email provider could handle that many, they all had limits, which wasn't acceptable to me. I am now going to college full time and not even checking my email daily anymore, but I still think Gmail is the best by far of all other email providers. The archives are a great way of preserving emails that would otherwise be lost. I still have emails of some of the troops who didn't make it home safely. When I do have the time to print them and put them in a scrapbook I don't have to worry about not being able to find them.



Melinda Firestone, Full-time student
Ohio

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A coworker traveled to Israel recently. The most reliable way we had to communicate was chat within Gmail. We were able to use the voice chat and transfer files easily. This really helped support somebody 10 hours away, on the other side of what would have been very expensive phone calls.



Jim Cook, Programmer
Redmond, Washington

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I'm a proud Army wife with a very busy life taking care of two teenagers and a toddler while my husband is in deployment for 15 months. We both tried to communicate by phone but it's not very possible on an everyday basis even if he's in Satellite Communication field, because of the amount of soldiers trying to do the shortcut and sneak in their galley just to call home. We learned about Gmail through my father in law and opened an account because it's simplier for him due to old age. Plus, I can send tons of photos and music as an attachment. He loves hearing his granddaughter sing. The most important thing is that I can leave my PC on, and open my Gmail, and get on with my chores at home while waiting for my hubby to go online then just chat. Because of the chat, I can leave a message for him real quick without composing an email even if he's not online. We can chat without worrying with time. Or while he works on his satellite. Or after work just to say goodnight. Or fighting over the few phones against other soldiers who really in need to call home. Thank you Gmail. Because of you, life for us couple being apart is a "little" bit bearable.



Welch Demorse, Army Wife
Ft. Bragg, NC

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My friend and I are recently finding ourselves in the working world. We use Gmail and Gmail chat to stay in touch and plan things to do together. We're now looking for an apartment together and use Gmail and Gmail chat that much more. It's nice because we can email each other or, if we're both online at the same time, just switch over to chatting. We're even using shared documents in Google Docs to track apartments we're interested in, have contacted, and details about the apartments. She's going off to France for a while and I know that we'll be able to keep up with all of this, even while she's thousands of miles away.



Marie Russo, Software development
Worcester, MA

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Gmail is the story of my high school life. My best friend and I would email twice a day when I was going through hard times. We would share stories, poems, and songs, I would rant about my day or just write whatever was on my mind. Now, whenever I think about how far I've gone, I can go back, read those conversations, and really value what my friend went through for me.



Anonymous student

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I'm up here in my cabin in the woods--just me and my dogs and my goats. No TV, no radio. Somehow (miraculously), I was able to get a satellite connection to the internet. So, my Gmail keeps me in touch with my friends (back in workaday-world).



Heidi, Retired
Woods of Northern PA

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My Gmail story is great because it is far more reaching than what I can describe to you in the here and now; I am writing a book about it. Really and truly! ...What I have done to trick myself into writing this book was incorporating Gmail. I set up a seperate Gmail account from my personal one and have been sending myself one chapter of my story at a time. The bonus of emailing yourself over just typing your work, is that it's timestamped and saved in cyberspace. Plus, you can trust Gmail to keep it safely until you are ready to visit it again. That's something a hard drive or manila folder can't always promise! I'm elbow deep into something I thought I would never be able to do - write a book! When this gets off the ground, I'm thanking Gmail in the opening page!



Soorya Arsala, Event Coordinator by day, future best-selling author by night
Orlando, FL

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When my daughter was born 14 months ago, I wanted to capture all of her developmental changes. But as I schleped off to work, I realized it was going to be difficult to find time to create that glorious scrapbook most mommies dream of passing down to their kids. So I created a Gmail account for my baby daughter and began writing her little notes of her daily, weekly and monthly milestones. It's a way to capture what she's doing, with a date and time stamp - an electronic scrapbook. I bragged about this idea to my friends having babies and they created accounts for their little ones. My daughter will have this Gmail address her whole life and I hope that she charishes the notes from her Mom, Dad and anyone else inclined to write to her.



Julie Barry, Marketing Director
Chicago

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Gmail has small text ads, but guess what: they are useful! I am a singer and I'm always willing to talk about singing. I was restricted with my vocal range and I always had to lower the songs that I sang, because the 'high' notes were too high. I was writing an email one day, when I saw an ad for a Voice Training program. So I thought, "Sure, why not?" I opened it up, and it took me directly to the Singing Success website. I thought it was very interesting, so one day I got it and started to work with it. I've been working with it for about 2 years now and I'm getting closer to the point where I'll be able to sing any song I want! I'm very close now! High C5 anyone?? :D I love singing, but without Gmail and that one ad, I probably would never have found Singing Success; I would still be locked up with my two-octave (if that!) range.



Jacob Hill, College Student
Virginia, USA

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Back when I was in High School, I was a head of the business division of our first Robotics team. Not only did Gmail allow me to segregate emails from just my team mates, it also had links to other cool Google apps like Calender and Spreadsheets. Using Gmail with both of those apps, my division created a time line for our build season, complete with email reminders being sent out on certain dates, as well as calculating cost and approximate weight for our robot. If it weren't for Gmail, the already hectic build season would have been even more so.



Chris Litchfield, UPS Loader
New Hampshire

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...In the past, I was supposed to erase every month my stuff because I did not have enough space to keep it all. Since I've known Gmail, I keep all my emails. Month after month, my life story is in archive. And I have access everywhere!! You help me to be in touch with my contacts, family and my love. I'm never surprise to see Gmail on the front when we speak about innovation... You give a second name to email!



Jean-Philippe Tremblay, Student
Montreal, Canada

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I have 2 best friends who live in Arizona and we call ourselves THE THREE. We keep in touch via Gmail and I feel like it's our own world. I enjoy the freedom. Thanks Gmail. I would slay dragons for you.



Elden Brooks, Finance
St George, UT

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My story with Gmail started in 2005, when one of my colleagues told me about his new email address, and its large capacity among the other email providers. My account remained active for around 1 year, being used very minimally, and I didn't even think of sharing this address with my friends. Then in 2006, I needed a separate email for business to correspond with many official centers, so I thought of Gmail. Slowly, I started discovering the numerous advantages of Gmail, few which I have to mention: 1. The accuracy of timing, which I noticed that appears at the top of any email. 2. All sent mails are saved automatically, by this I can reach any person I've corresponded in the past. 3. Auto-saving of email addresses, so I don't have to fill forms whenever I add a new contact. 4. The rapid "Check-spelling" function, which really impresses me everytime I forget a letter here or there. 5. The most important feature -in my opinion- is the search feature, in which I can track any email, by just remembering one word in its text, and that saves me a lot of time and effort. For all these reasons, and many others, I really enjoy using Gmail in corresponding, and since the beginning of 2007, Gmail became my official email.



Haroon Haj Ismail, Physician

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I had just left a very long and unhealthy relationship and was looking forward to a long period of being single and saving money. That was until I meet my best friend's wife's cousin. I lived in Houston and she lived in Dallas, but she had a short contract in Houston. Well, one dinner lead to two then three. Well before we knew it, we were conversing via Gmail every single day. Now, she's my wife and she cherishes those emails. In this day and age, love letters still work.



Rick, Storage Architect (aka tape monkey)
Dallas, TX

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It started out as your average high school love story, boy meets girl, boy likes girl, needless to say I fell in love with this girl. Well as it turns out she was from Poland and they had moved to my home town around the same time I did. To make a long story short she could have easily went to college for close to nothing in the U.S. but moved back to Poland to keep her family together. We missed each other so much and needed a great fast reliable way to communicate. Of course I had heard good things about Gmail before but never created an account with you guys. Anywho, I made an email account and I have never been more satisfied with one since. Gmail is great! We keep in touch via email for free instead of spending probably hundreds on phone cards. Just thought I would say thank you for keeping me in touch with my best friend!



Brett Westcott, Student
Purdue University

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I have been delivered from the spam avalanche!!! With my previous service, I was getting 200 emails a day, 98 percent of them spam - even using their "filters". If I didn't check my email for a
weekend, it would be 950 emails... but not with Gmail!!



Steve Skovira, CT Scan Tech
Shavertown, PA

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When we last moved, I lost several of my very favorite recipes. I have managed to recover most of them, but not all, and I wanted to avoid ever losing these old friends again. Papers get lost, husbands redo hard drives and delete programs and files they don't think are important, and hard drives do crash. So I am emailing my recipes to myself in Gmail and archiving them. Now I know they are safe.



Cherie J. Guelker, Retired teacher
Marthasville, MO

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I set up a Gmail account for my 7 year-old so she could be e-pals with an old pre-school friend who no longer goes to school with her. We are just beginning the adventure of "agentfairy" and her e-pal. They are excited to share more of life's little tidbits with each other; as parents, we are glad to have found a way for our children to maintain a friendship and develop many skills, such as letter writing, written expression, and reflection on life experiences through what is now common-place technology which will undoubtedly be an integral part of their entire lives.



Christina Mayne, Kindergarten Teacher
Austin, TX

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Gmail has saved me about $520 over the last 2 and a half years. I haven't had to buy a printer, and therefore I haven't had to buy cartridges for it. I use Gmail to send my completed assignments to myself, and I print them out at school, it's worked wonderfully for me. Especially when it comes to printing out 10 page essays or 20 page articles, who pays for it? My school!



Matt Pullman, Student
New Jersey

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Gmail, with Google Docs has allowed me to get serious help writing papers for school from a friend of mine in Florida. I upload my doc, email him an invite, and then chat for editing and advice. I'm getting an A in my English class because of it!



Samantha, Student and Bartender
Pennsylvania

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The reason I use Gmail is because of a missionary friend who is away from home for quite a while. I've kept in touch with her since March after I opened this account which she recommended me to use it. Almost everyday, I write to her using Gmail.



Michelle Hoon-Koo Ee Mui, Homemaker
Singapore

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My husband and I have been trying for 2 years to have a child. We have had a very long road with a miscarriage and 2 premature births. This March when we found out that I was pregnant again I was placed on modified bed rest and was very limited as to what I was able to do. I had a million doctor appointments and that was my only contact with the outside world. I have a very large family and lots of friends who wanted to know how things were going through and so I started the pregnancy update with Gmail. Weekly after my doctor appointments I would email friends and family (including my brother who was stationed with the military in Iraq) about how the pregnancy was progressing and what the doctors had to say. By the time my daughter was born (at 39 weeks and healthy) I had over 40 people on my list. My Grandfather calls it the Daily Blab and my friends and family walked with me step by step to a very successful pregnancy and delivery even though they were across the country and even a world away.



Melissa Haynie, Homemaker
Roscoe, IL

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I signed up for Gmail, and was really happy about it. My brother who travels often to Europe, and a friend based in Singapore send me emails, pictures and updates once or twice a week. We can also send pictures with higher megapixels, which is a relief. I have used the chat system so much that it has opened communications on a higher level with a friend who is now in Germany. We keep in touch often through Gmail chat. I also used this email during my MBA course and sending presentations to my group mates made it easier for us to understand and find ways to solve our case study. Without Gmail, I don't know how I can get in touch with my brother who travels a lot and greet him on his birthday. I wonder would my world be without Gmail... it must have been lonely...



Bobby M. Ligot, Personnel Assistant
Saudi Arabia

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When I wake up in the morning, my Gmail Notifier notifies me that it loves me and starts my day off right. I usually make some eggs then come to check my mail, which is always chock full of cool stuff cause I'm a cool guy (because I use Gmail). Sometimes my computer decides to throw a gigantic tantrum and hibernate for months at a time. This isn't a problem since I've got about 400 MB of important files on Gmail, which is only a small fraction of the total storage. If I wanted to, I could write the next great novel, convert each paragraph into some monstrously huge file and store them, labeled and sorted, on Gmail. Sure that wouldn't be practical or efficient, but with this much storage it just doesn't matter anymore. Gmail is really important to me. If it shut down or something I'd probably turn into some bitter jerk and sulk, spending the rest of my life sitting in front of the television crying and watching Jeopardy. I'd get every question wrong too, cause you can't play Jeopardy without Gmail. Gmail is such a large part of my life that I have stenciled the logo onto all my clothes and named my two children "Gmail" and "Coloured Labels." They are both incredibly popular in school due to their names.



Jamie Gagno, Student
Ontario, Canada

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I starting using Gmail last summer when my other email server stopped working. It was so easy to set up and have all of my email transfered! I have been using Gmail since and have been excited to
find other friends of mine that also use Gmail. We are able to chat throughout the day via Gmail, saving us hefty phone bills! Not to mention the decrease of spam!



Jamie, Stay-at-home mom
Columbus, Ohio

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Using Gmail, my emailing has become easier. Not only do I enjoy the easy access of everything, I enjoy that anyone I email I will never forget their email address since it's auto-saved. I use Gmail to transfer mp3 files between computers or star an important email I sent to myself to remember for later. I have never had to delete any important emails.



Chase
Flint, MI

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I am a graduate student at University of Wisconsin, Madison. My friends and I hang out every Friday night. We are all from different departments and don't get to interact with each other during the week due to our busy schedules. Gmail has been a very efficient way for coordinating and planning things as to what we want to do on Friday night. There will be about 60 emails sent back and forth among 10 people. The amazing thing is, everything gets categorized as a single "conversation" instead of spamming our inbox.



Janani Kalyanam, Student
Madison, WI

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I first used Gmail on the recommendation of a friend. My first thought was that I have too many email addresses already. As I quickly found out, though, Gmail was able to take care of that. I use Gmail to check mail at all of my addresses. Gmail replies to a sender from the address they sent the message to. This keeps my Gmail account private. I really appreciate that. I have access to all my accounts with one easy location.



Aaron, Machine Sales
Minnesota

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My friends are all in college, and I'm still in high school. When they went off to college, we traded emails, and have been able to keep up with each other. Over the time they've been at BGSU, they've helped me with everything - including my choosing my college. It's been wonderful using Gmail to talk to them, we keep track of everything.



Tami Ehrman, Student
Ohio

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Some friends and I have effectively started our own little message board. Back in January 2006, a friend sent a bunch of people a quick joke email, to which a few of us fired off a reply-all response. Shortly after, everyone kept replying to everyone else on the CC list, submitting pictures, anecdotes, having conversations. Over time, people introduced their friends and coworkers to this. At over 30 people, and well over 3000 replies, Gmail's email grouping and label indexing has allowed us to keep all our social lives, jokes, pictures, and random discussion in our little forum, cleanly seperated from the other content sitting in our archive.



Jacob Hammer, Civil Engineer
Ottawa, Canada

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I am a 54 year old law student and I use my Gmail to email backups of my outlines and important papers, so that if my computer crashes, I haven't lost all of my hard work...



Kathy Loo, Law Student
San Francisco

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Gmail has really helped me keep my club together! The club consists of home schooled kids, so talking around school wouldn't work. I use Gmail to send them all a newsletter at the same time, really easily. Then I can simply chat with them if they had any questions. Gmail has also helped me keep in touch with some of my friends who are far away, or ones who never have their phone. And also, with Gmail, I always get the emails I want to come through (like the newsletters I've signed up for, which used to be sent to the junk folder by my old email service) - and the ones I don't, don't come! I've been using Gmail for a long while now, and not once have I ever gotten a spam or junk email!



Hannah Henson, Jr. high student
Apex, North Carolina

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I have lived in the same neighborhood for close to 18 years. It wasn't until I started taking the bus to my community college that I met some boy that happened to walk the same way... everyday. This guy was the man of my dreams (tall, dark hair, handsome). He had lived a few blocks down his whole life. Because I was captivated by this guy, I started having lunch with him and his friends everyday (meaning I skipped every class to sit at the same table as him). I never once told him that I liked him or even hinted at it. I did this for about a year... then he set me up a Gmail account. Evidently he loved me too and thought that was the best discrete way to be able to talk with me after I left campus. So finally he asked me to date him and we are getting engaged and will marry Oct. 2009 (when we are both done with our Bachelors degree). Took him long enough! I have Gmail to thank for meeting my husband (to be)!



Dianna Barker, Waitress/University Student
Vancouver, Washington

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I am normally not the type of person to send in thank you letters to companies, but with Gmail I think I'll make an exception. When I started work at my internship this summer I was horrified at the thought of spending my whole day in front of a computer in a cubicle with no one to talk to. But I quickly discovered Gmail chat and my whole summer turned around. I was able to keep occupied during the many down times by talking to my friends who were also bored at their internships. This also works great in my classes, since many of them are held in computer labs with access to Gmail. My friends and I often use chat to keep entertained during the boring lectures. I also love the fact that I can search mail - I don't know how many times I have forgotten the date of something and simply searched for it and found it, instead of having to sort through countless emails. In addition, the amount of storage means I never have to delete anything. I can't tell you how often I would delete an email that I would later need using my college's email system. Gmail ensures that I never lose that valuable information ever again...



Jeanne, Student
West Chester, OH

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I have been using email daily since the late 80's or early 90's, it has been so long I forget, and I have used countless different email providers and accounts. Some were good, others horrible to use, and lately spam has plagued my email accounts. I have junk email accounts, work accounts, alumni accounts, and personal accounts. Of all these accounts there is only one that makes checking and sending email enjoyable, my GMAIL. I only wish all of my email accounts were as good. It helps me every day and makes life more enjoyable.



Michael, Director - IOS HR Consulting
US and Japan

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No spam with Gmail means more time to get to my important emails. I had other email accounts under other providers but I'd rather spend my time reading my emails and not reading how a pill can help me pleasure my significant other.



Andrew, Arts
Virginia

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I moved from Georgia to Colorado. I had lived there for 11 years. Moving to a new place is hard but, I have the support of old friends to help me through thanks to Gmail!



Spencer, 7th Grade
Colorado

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I am a supply chain superintendent for Sohar Aluminum in the Sultanate of Oman. We are building an Aluminum smelter here in Oman, but earlier this year we were hit by a tropical storm called "Gonu". It has done countless millions of dollars worth of damage in the country and only now are we starting to recover. Although the plant itself remained untouched all of our office space was deep in water and communication were almost impossible. All of our procurement records are held on our SAP system which thankfully survived as well as all the backups. Therefore our business continuity plan was to move to Gmail for all our overseas procurement activity. We have some 400 overseas vendors in all corners of the globe. We announced soon after the disaster struck that we would move everything to Gmail as a business continuity plan. This helped to retain our progress on the project. Being web based we had no need to worry about server access from our underwater offices. We operated like this for at least 30 days working out of the Radison hotel bedrooms all connected to Gmail and our vendors overseas. Thanks to Gmail and thanks to the mobile wireless operator - it was easy to use wherever you are in the world.



Dr. Graham R Smith, Supply Chain Superintendent
Sohar, Sultanate of Oman

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We have been using Gmail for all our organization, personal and training talks. We have made it mandatory to have a Gmail account when students enroll into our training program thus streamlined all our trainees in one umbrella, Gmail. Running our business has become so easy that we are never lost. Even when our faculty is not around the laptop, he is connected to Gmail and chat on his mobile phone. Our students are happy that we are available, ALWAYS.



Prabhu, IT related Online Training Center
Bangalore, India

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My husband got a great job last year. Only draw back it was in Iraq. Before he left he set me up with Gmail. It was so nice to be able to chat and have little conversations with him. Our kids learned how to email and chat also. Of course I have all of our conversations saved. He will probably be going to Afghanistan this year, hopefully it will not be for as long, but I know I will be able to keep in touch with him.



Lisa Bryant, Assistant Office Manager
Florida

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After 31 years at an unnamed, New York-based consulting firm, I (and many of my friends and co-workers) decided to leave the firm. After leaving, I realized that the email account I had been using since the invention of email -- my corporate Enterprise server account -- was no longer my lifeline to the outside (and inside) world. I was lost. I was forlorn. I was lonely. I no longer got 450 emails a day, which made me sad, even though only about 6 of them were useful and informative. Many of the rest of them seemed to deal with presumably desirable anatomical augmentations. But then, I noticed -- while borrowing a friend's email account -- that Google had started something called Gmail, and I was SELECTED to receive -- by invitation only -- a new Gmail account. How could I refuse? I hadn't gotten anything free since a sample of toothpaste came in the mail about 2 years ago. So I signed up. And so did all of my former co-workers, after I told them about Gmail. Now we had a new little community of Gmail users, and we felt quite special and very privileged. Using our new Gmail (and, of course, a Google-provided webhosting service), we started a new little business of our own. And now we have offices in Irvine, Laguna Beach, Honolulu and Scottsdale. Google and Gmail saved the day, and now we get a paycheck again. We will always cherish Gmail for facilitating the launch of our new business, and even though we now have an Enterprise Server again, we know that whenever it goes down (never more than 3 or 4 times an hour), we have Gmail to save our days.



Mom and Dad, Self employed parents
Laguna Beach

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Upon making my web page, I established my new email account with Gmail. The obvious problem made itself apparent. How am I going to manage my addresses and past emails? I opened my Google account, instructed Gmail to download all my mail from the "old account" and the "new one" to my google account. Then I instructed Gmail to send all my mail under my web page email and attach my new electronic presentation card. No pain and all gains!



Jose Roberto Lizama, Psychiatrist
El Salvador

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I cannot remember to save email addresses... But with Gmail, if I have emailed them even once then I can type in the "To:" field and, BOOM! There they are! Also, I just want to say that my husband and I met in high school... he had to go back to South Africa (his country) after which I followed and we were married. Shortly after we were married, I had to return to the US to have our first child, but he could not follow until his green card was issued. That took 1 year and 3 months. Phone calls are expensive. Gmail served as our communication for 1 year and 3 months. You should be proud for keeping our marriage together over 6000 miles and almost a year and a half. We are still happily married and have 2 beautiful girls. He's the most wonderful man in the whole world...



Alice Venter
Atlanta, GA

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My sister and I have always been extremely close. We lived 10 min away from each other and since we both worked in downtown Nashville, we even were able to eat lunch together with Monday through Friday. So you can imagine how sad I was when Bonnie, my sister, and her husband moved from Nashville all the way to New Hampshire. When Bonnie moved, she created a Gmail account for me and we have been able to chat all day through Gmail. Although it's not the same thing as being able to talk in person, it really does make it seem like she isn't that far way.



Bobbi Eddington, Paralegal
Nashville, TN

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I manage several accounts and one of them requires me to keep people across the country updated on changes and additions to this particular program. Additionally, I travel and train and have several emails to juggle while on the road. Gmail has helped me to manage all my accounts in one place, no matter where I am. I have my contacts, emails, and calendar everywhere. Additionally, I use chat for having conversations with many of the people I am assisting while doing other things as well. Google lets me maximize my greatest talent which is multitasking.



Deborah Rose, Consultant
Dallas, TX

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I've been with my girlfriend (now fiance) for almost 7 years now. In that span of time I was simply running out of gift ideas to get her and re-using the same old things over again. We had finished watching the movie " The Notebook" and she was definitely touched by the whole movie. Using Gmail's massive storage (no deleting emails!), and search options; I was able to trace back and timeline our whole relationship together from emails, hotel confirmations, everything! I was able to write out a 320 page book detailing every memorable moment we shared. When she asked how I could of remembered so much, she just assumed I was incredibly thoughtful. But I guess you and I know its thanks to Gmail!



Tim V., Programmer
Miami, Florida

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I was looking for a long lost friend through Google. Since my lost friend is a professional, I was able to find an article he wrote and from there, find his professional email. I jumped on the occasion to send him a mail from my Gmail and Voilà! He is still in Rome, Italy while I am here in Canada and we were able to reconnect just on time for the Holidays.



Valérie Goulet, Student
Québec, Canada

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My boyfriend and I started seeing each other a month before he had to move out of the state. He didn't want a long distance relationship so we were going our separate ways. One day, through
Gmail, we started this thing where we'd small talk, ask a trivia question, a personal question, then answer questions asked to us, then end it off with a funny or interesting picture we found online. We got to know so much about each other - our life, our views, the things we are interested in, our sense of humor.... Seven months later, we are still long distance, but we are together as a couple, and closer than ever!!



Chiye Fox, Teacher
Baton Rouge, LA

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I am a stay home mom and a small business owner. I started my online store about a year ago. I can't run my business without Gmail. Every time my online shopping cart sends my customers order or shipping confirmation emails, I bcc the emails to my Gmail. So when a customer calls to inquiry an order, I can quickly pull up her order information on Gmail using the search function. The search function is so fast and it searches on everything. Often times, customers would call and do not have their order numbers, with Gmail, I was able to pull up her order and all her previous orders and email conversations given her name or email address. It helped me be on top of customer's need and provide great customer service that is essential to my business.



Christie, Small Business Owner
California

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I used a Gmail account to receive and filter responses to a posting in which I was looking for interviewees for my thesis. As responses came in, it was easy to organize respondents into groups and track the qualitative data by searching and marking messages. It made the research process incredibly more efficient.



Michael Lance, School Administrator
Plymouth, MI

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I moved to DC after living in St. Louis Missouri for ten years. I did not want to move for one reason: I had all these great friends in St. Louis. With Gmail I not only kept in touch, but I also continued to email with the new friends of my friends. Without Gmail I could have never stayed in touch as well and now, using Gmail we are organizing events so we can met up again this summer.



Robert, Student
Washington DC

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The Gmail spam filter is the best I've ever used. Virtually none gets through to my Gmail inbox. I love the clean desktop of Gmail. My wife uses another service and it drives me nuts with ads and spam she gets. I'll get her on Gmail yet... Thanks for your willingness to think outside the desktop.



David Toburen, Retired Educator (though you never retire from teaching)
Georgia

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I got Gmail years ago just because it was the latest email thing to do. Anyway, I've been so happy with it. If I ever forget to organize things, I know that all I have to do is put in a search, and within seconds I have what I'm looking for. It's helped me a lot as a teacher because I often get things forwarded to me and then forget about it. Once I remember, I just have to search for it!



Chanie, Teacher

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I work with people in different time zones from all over the world and travel a lot for leisure. So when I'm in bed in Barcelona, on the Aletsch Glacier in Switzerland or in the Kalahari dessert in South Africa, I'm still just two clicks away from my Gmail on my N95 mobile phone...



Gedeon, Self Employed
London

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I keep forgetting what my girlfriend told me 2 or 3 weeks ago... and she remembers everything! Which makes her really mad when I forget something I told her or something she told me. But, with Gmail's chat archive I can always go back to my conversations and see what we talked about! Now, thanks to Gmail, my girlfriend doesn't get mad at my anymore... at least not for this reason!



Nitin, VFX Student
Los Angeles, CA

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My Gmail lets me flag messages with pictures, or conversations from different groups, which helps in finding emails I need. I don't use any other IM service, and love that I can chat with friends and that conversation is saved. I do volunteer PR work for various local nonprofits, and a separate email address lets me track media lists and various press releases that go out (organized by each organization)... And, when I need to send reminders to media, or update the original info I sent, it's almost too easy to find my original email.



Alexis
Santa Fe, NM

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I had a boyfriend who had Gmail. He used to tell me about it, how much space it's got and how good it is. I never paid any attention. Then he had to leave the country. We did not know when he would come back and whether he would at all. He signed me up for Gmail and now we talk in it. It gives us a chance not to delete any emails that are important for us, chat when we want, and keep the chain of our messages. We love it. Thank you for keeping us together.



Nat, Student
USA

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I've been a Gmail user now for over three years and I live in a small town about an hour and a half south of Sydney all the way down in Australia. I have friends and family all over the place, the furthest being overseas in Canada and communicating is hard on the phone due to time differences. Gmail has allowed me to communicate back and forth and with so much fun. Not only do I use Gmail for emailing friends and family, but I also use it as a backup of important assignments. Too many times I've lost work because the medium I use to transport my assignments has failed on me. So now, I send an email to myself with the attached assignment and archive it away for a rainy day. It's also a great way to store photos you've received but just don't want to delete. I love the size of the inbox, I love the ability to chat as well while browsing emails and above all how easy it is to use... It's so user friendly and so much nicer to look at with no annoying animated advertisements to distract and slow your loading time.



Mel, Student
Wollongong, Australia

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I would get tons of spam, until I switched to Gmail. Now I just report it and its gone... Now the "Delete All Spam" button does 5 minutes of work in seconds. Thank you Gmail because every second counts!!



Randy, Student
College Station

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I have used Gmail for 1 year and have over 4,000 emails concerning all of the projects I have financed. Two days ago, I spilled a coke on my computer -- but all was okay. All I had to do was log on to Gmail using my husband's computer and there were all of my projects! You saved me about $800,000!



Paula Swanson, Commercial Project Financier
Utah

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With my previous email accounts, I would get MASSIVE SPAM!!! And when I would mark it as spam, I would still get it... I have had Gmail for about 2 years, and have gotten a grand total of 2 spam messages. I used to get about 50 spam messages a day on my other accounts! Now I can chat with my friends without having to pay money or
install anything.



Emi Serna
Albuquerque, New Mexico

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I got my Gmail on May 18, 2005. How do I know? I still have your welcome email, because I don't have to delete many emails thanks to your very generous storage space. I use filters extensively to categorize my email with labels and to highlight important emails with stars. So when I check my email, which is more and more often, the first thing I do is read the ones with stars... I like the fact that your email chains make it easy to refer back to previous parts of a particular conversation. I use the filter and forward to send a backup copy of important information to another email address on my domain name. I love your groups feature and use it extensively. I love how good your search feature is, to cover what your labels don't cover in the first place. Gmail is my connection to family friends and colleagues who are mostly on the East Coast and in Iceland.



Jon K. Kristinsson, Railroad Signal Consultant
Littleton, Colorado

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I was referred to Gmail by a friend, a programmer, who had an account and really loved it... Since then I have become addicted. Mostly because I love the tabbed email system, as well as the ability to pop-out an email so I can jump between email messages and copy/paste between them. Other online email systems do not have this ability! The kicker is that you got me employed. If it was not for the great ability to search through all my email fast (while on the phone with someone waiting) I would not have the job I have today.



Henry Pierluissi, Software Architect
Austin TX

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Using a college email and a website linked email I was frustrated from bouncing from one to another and did not like any of the other email options I had tried. I tried Gmail, selected the name of my website as my email and got it without adding several odd numbers to the end of it. I linked my school account to my Gmail account. I also added another email for job applications and work related stuff, as I am a civil engineering/management student so I wanted an email that I could send resumes out to companies. Later I also added a 3rd email for the club that I spun off of our website. We use it for information such as PayPal and other information we need saved so that a couple of our board of directors can access the account. Gmail is simple and easy to use, its easy on the eyes without aggravating pop ups and ads that lag a broke college kids' laptop down. Gmail has helped me keep track of documents for school, send proposals for sponsorship with my website, and resumes to try and line up that soon to come high dollar job to buy that new laptop.



Jason Manning, Student/Jeep Club Pres.
Bridgeport, West Virginia

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A hobby of mine, or should I call it a "passion", is songwriting and I've been doing it for almost 20 years now. The guys I write with are geographically separated and we have limited time in the main studio to get what we need done. We all have computer-based recording gear at our respective homes and work on tunes by recording overdub tracks to an MP3 master track that we create in the studio. We rely on email to send tracks to each other for review and ultimately to be added to the master song file. Enter Gmail. We started by using the ISP mail that we each have and quickly realized that the storage limitations of those mail systems were a barrier to the creative process. One of the guys who I write with showed me Gmail and I was floored by the amount of storage that is available to every user. Needless to say, we are all on Gmail now.


The chat feature of Gmail has been quite useful to us as well - I send an MP3 mixdown of the master combined with a take that I did on bass guitar to my writing partners. As they are listening, they are able to comment on the performance in real time. While it is not the same vibe as collaborating in the studio, it is certainly a step towards that.



David Friend, Technology Services and Solutions
Canada

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When my history teacher assigned a group project, me and my friends had to find a way to stay in touch to work on it. I already had a Gmail account, and so I asked them if they had one too. None of them knew what it was, so we all got one and stayed in touch throughout the project. Now we all use Gmail everyday and thanks to Gmail, our project (sandstorm) was a success!



Janae Allen, Student
New York

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As a training consultant, I need to be sure my materials and presentations are available, even if equipment goes south - so I upload copies of presentations, handouts, etc. as attachments. Also, as a very frequent traveler, I have uploaded copies of my passport pages, airline e-tickets, bookings, itineraries and other information I need to have available. Travelers are advised to carry a copy of passport data and visa pages - even if the worst happens (like an Antarctic cruise ship sinking and having to bail with only your all-weather gear,) I can always download copies of these vital documents anywhere in the world with Internet access! Of course, keeping in touch with others while I am on the road - and if I need to access websites I am concerned about accessing on Internet cafe computers and the like, I have the user and passwords hidden in character strings I can copy and paste into the website logon page; this avoid possible keystroke logging malware. My life can be less complicated and more secure - "no worries, I have backups available on Gmail."



Jose Kirchner, Consultant
Northern California

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I work in a rigorous high school program for students interested in science and math careers. For part of my job, I oversee high school seniors who work with military-based and other highly classified personnel on research projects. We are CONSTANTLY emailing one another notes, files, pictures, etc. Being part of a public school, my school system email account does not allow for me to use much space for emails, let alone emails with attachments. Gmail allows me to type in a student's name and pull up ALL communication quickly... this is great for paperless documentation. Gmail also provides the space needed for rather large files. It also does a great job eliminating junk mail for me. Furthermore, all the classified personnel are able to open my emails from Gmail; but they cannot open with some other email services. So, Gmail is great... it is so great that we even tell our students to open Gmail accounts. Love the free, dependable, and easy service.



Yvonne Gabriel, Teacher
Aberdeen, Maryland

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With Gmail, all of my relatives and friends are on my screen, no matter which part of the planet they are in. My files are also on Gmail, so I don't care about PC break-downs. I have songs uploaded to Gmail and the MP3 player gives me the chance to listen to my favourite hits anywhere on planet earth...My docs and all other important files are easily accessible and easy to share wherever I am. It's not just email, it's much more. I get my web-site responses, newsletters, angry shouts from sister and even spam. Well, the spam just rocks. 99.5% of spam are arrested before they even look at me. I love it, the clean inbox.



Hakeem, Student
Sri Lanka, Colombo

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Me and my girlfriend had a long distance relationship for three years since 2003. I clearly remember that since April 2004, we had started using Gmail as our primary mode of communication and this turned the whole communication method. Even when I was at work and personal emailing was "blocked", I could use Gmail. I have really found a good source to keep my relationship alive and finally when I arrived in NY for my further studies, I still use Gmail as she is in Boston for work. I really love the way Gmail's new and innovative ways have increased privacy and reliability.



AJ, Grad Student
New York

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Gmail spam filter works just great. It has cut down most of nuisance mails and saved whole lot of time. Also the chat saving and search with a single login is just incredible! It is just part of my life.



Balaji, System Analyst
Jackson, Mississippi

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Gmail is a wonderful thing...Along with Calendar I can manage my insane surgery schedule. It also allows me to get together my six email accounts in one place, and read them on the web late at night in the hospital while working. I do have very special hours... And The quick and easy archiving couldn't be easier...



Shelley Susman, Doctor
Los Angeles, CA

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I love my Gmail account. I switched a few years ago and have never looked back. I've placed my blog address in the signature file that goes out on all of my emails and it has done wonders to up the traffic on my site.



Christa, Manager of Trend and Innovation at a retail company
New York

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I participate in an online debating forum that is hosted with proprietary software that does provide numerical indexing, but has very limited (and slow) search capabilities. This makes it almost impossible to go back and find something you've read in the past. Whenever I come across something I may want to refer back to, I email it to my Gmail account. Doing this provides me with the power to apply the legendary Google search technology to content. Just between you and I, this provides me with a huge advantage over my opponents in that historical research that is impractical for them is trivial for me. Just don't tell them my secret!



Dave Blickstein, Software Engineer
New York

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For me, email really didn't exist before Gmail. I had other email accounts, but they all were so riddled with spam that it was impossible to make heads or tails of legitimate email. Because of this, I really never used them for important email. It wasnt until I discovered the awesome power of Gmail, its label system, and its filters (both custom and spam), that I really discovered how useful email can be. It was the end of 2004 to early 2005, my senior year in High School. Now, I cant imagine using the internet without Gmail. It has defined email, and it has defined the web.



Dustin Sparks, Interactive Developer
Muncie, Indiana

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I recently graduated and got my first job teaching middle school. My new principal, a self-professed "geek," directed me to teach a computer elective focusing on the tools of Web 2.0. I was pretty nervous about it, but after securing permission slips, set my 26 charges to the task of creating their own Google accounts, of which Gmail was an integral part. I can honestly write that Google and Gmail saved my bacon this semester. We've all learned something, and the kids have shown me rich emoticons and multi-person chat in Gmail. I've shown them how to search archives and make notes, and we've all worked with Google Docs and iGoogle. I'm glad you've given us the opportunity to thank you -- with the Gmail, as I like to call it, the kids have learned AND had fun while doing so.



Aimee Orr, Middle School Teacher
Eugene, OR, USA

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I am a personal trainer and have found Gmail to be a wonderful tool for communicating with clients, either back home in the US or here in the UK. I can email them their cardio plans and in conjunction with Google Docs, and can share access to their diet plans. I can monitor them without losing a single document. It's also great for sharing spreadsheets with other trainers. I absolutely love Gmail and would never go w/ another email account ever again!



Nicole, Personal Trainer
UK

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My friends and I (a group of 15+) work across the country (Trinidad) and can't always get together. Gmail threads keep us in touch and allow us to joke around and play on those longstanding inside jokes. With sometimes more than 20 persons on a thread and hitting reply all, it gets to be quite fun and a good way to keep connected.



Tamara, Marketing
Trinidad

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My friend Josh and I used to chat on Gmail all the time, I mean really, I wasted away the work day talking with him about everything but mainly the U. of S. Florida Cycling team which he founded and of which I am a member. On October 21st Josh was killed in an accident on one of our rides. A few weeks ago I stumbled across the saved chats. I had no idea that those chats were saved. I treasure them now as they are a glimpse at my friendship with this amazing individual.



Kristy, Finance
Tampa, Florida

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Since I have Gmail, my life keeps getting easier every day. With my friends, we share the fun stuff about our trips and reunions. Gmail is fun, easy, and the best IS FREE. My spam is very low and I personalize my inbox with the new labels and colors. And chat in the same window??? No more installations and no more leaving the chat open on other computers. Gmail also make easy to share my photos with my friends and family.



Carlos Arbelaez, Software Developer
Medellin - Colombia - South America

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My boyfriend and I met while working together. Since we had to keep it quiet for a while, but we were in that stage where you want to be with the other person all the time, Gmail Chat was the perfect way for us to keep in touch throughout the day. We both ended up at different jobs after that and were still able to keep in touch all day with Gmail Chat. We still talk on it pretty regularly when I am at home and he is at work or vice versa. One of the best parts of Gmail is putting a random word in the "search mail" box and seeing what random chat from years ago pops up. Reading conversations from that period in our lives when everything was new and exciting brings back those feelings and makes me remember just what it was that made us fall so hard for each other.



Jamie
Knoxville

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My name is SSG Ayauna Oliver, and am currently deployed. Through the miracle that is Gmail, I can talk to my family in the states, and my family in Iraq, all while saving every e-mail that has
sentimental value; including all attachments. Gmail has served as my personal morale booster, cause I know that anytime I miss my family, spread throughout this very world, I can look up their correspondence (through your easy to use labels) and read a message that reminds me of
home. Thanks for your support....



Ayaunam, Staff Sergeant in the U.S. Army
Camp Carroll, Patriot-South, Korea

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Gmail has become part of my daily life. Not a day goes by that I do not check my mail and I never fear losing my important mail. Since the day I started using Gmail, I have not thought about Gmail. This is in fact good. This is what I would expect from a mail application. I can concentrate on using Gmail, rather than thinking about safety, reliability and robustness of my mail application. Has Gmail changed the way I send mail? Yes! but more importantly, what it did do for me is that after a long time I found a mail application that is simple and pratically invisble. When I open my inbox, I see my mail, not ads, no flashing irritating bold big font keyword ads. This is how Gmail has changed my way of mailing. No funny incident, no interesting story, nothing fancy. Plain and simple...



Ravindra Josyula, Software Engineer
Pune, India

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One day a friend used an expression "just kidding" in teasing me. I knew for a fact that he had done this a lot, so I did a Gmail email search to get all those other occasions. I simply did a copy and paste with all those other occasions, and he's not used that expression since. Some of those occasions dated back three years!



John, Nurse
Ontario

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When I was home in Wyoming last year looking after my mother, who was in hospice dying of cancer, email was so important for keeping in touch with my friends and family in Ireland. Everyday I checked my email on the hospice computer...My son had switched to Gmail after college and suggested that I do the same. It became a lifeline when my mother was ill. Now that I am back in Ireland I love being online and having a Gmail chat, which is saveable, with my son in Minnesota. I love the way the chat window just pops up in orange and he says "hey". I love the endless memory and I LOVE the commitment to eliminating spam.



Leslie Brown, Social Worker
Ireland

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Gmail mobile is highly practical when compared with other tools available for cell phones. It works great with my classic cellphone, it's not a choosy software only compatible with some more recent models. Also, I can take a look at all attachments including photos while I'm on the road.



Ercan Arisoy, Artist (Photography & Painting)
Istanbul

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I keep a photo of my late father in Gmail so no matter where in the world I am, I'll be able to see him. This way he's always here with me, just his form has changed.



Andrew

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I have been using Gmail since January 2005, and its services have allowed me to maintain some semblance of order in my crazy college life. I love how I am able to manage three email accounts from my main Gmail account through the use of POP3. This is so useful since I can stay up to date on developments with my personal life, my internship, Student Government, and my university email account all at once. The enormous storage space also allows me to save everything so I can find old papers or photos or whatever. Gmail Chat is also critical to my ability to stay in touch with friends and family - since I live in Rome but am from Kansas City, the time difference can usually create some problems. I am especially happy that Gmail Chat is now integrated with AIM. As I work on a variety of computers, some of which do not even have Flash and cannot download AIM software. So, being able to use Gmail as a platform for all my messaging and email needs is immensely helpful.



Kristen Mapes, Student
Kansas City, USA and Rome, Italy

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My step-mother is suffering from ALS and she is unable to talk. Maggie uses a portable keyboard that she types into and it's voice speaks for her. Using Gmail Chat has allowed us to "talk" for as long as we want. It's fast, fun and easy. And now with Group Chat my whole family can catch up with Maggie, and each other. We are a Gmail family!



Anne
Charleston, South Carolina

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I am in my freshman year in college. Gmail helped me to email all of my important homework and essays to my professors, which is very useful!



Jashorse

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Gmail is AWESOME! I like the way I can connect with people via chat anytime of the day as long as I am logged in, and build a huge contact list at the same time. The Gmail system is a great tool to keep up with friends, family, colleagues and business associates. Beats other contact management databases any day!



Catherine Heridis

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When I built a new computer for my grandmother to replace her old machine, I upgraded her to a new email program. The "magic" happened when she was at our house wishing she could recall the contents of a message and I let her login to her Gmail account from our machine. Earthshattering!



Tim Edwards, Software Architect
Austin, Texas

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I love Gmail! If I don't understand my homework and I need help, then all I do is see if any of my friends are on or are available to chat and I ask them my question and I get the answer from my friend in a few seconds while with other services it is almost impossible to get answers quickly.



Shruti, Student
Texas

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I was lucky enough to marry my wonderful boyfriend of 5.5 years on May 19, 2007. On August 18, 2007, he deployed to Iraq for his first tour of duty since becoming an officer in the United States Army. Gmail and Gmail chat have been lifesavers for our relationship. I am still in college (graduating in May '08!) and since I am on campus I am constantly on Gmail. Shortly after deploying my husband got his own Gmail account specifically to talk to me on Gmail chat (with nothing to download and no extra windows, it has been super easy for him to use Gmail chat with the limited Army internet service in Iraq). I also am the only one with his Gmail address, so I can have an inbox all to myself! Thanks Gmail, for keeping us connected!



Jenifer Eaves, Student
Alabama

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I have been using Gmail for years and have been waiting for the moment I can say my thanks. At last the day has arrived and I am going share something very close to my heart. For my higher education I had to leave to a new place a few thousands of kilometers away. Being in a new place itself was a big problem but more of loneliness which troubled me a lot. Then one day I came to know that you can chat from Gmail and don't have to download any messenger. This was a real blessing since many colleges wont allow installations without administration rights and my girlfriend used to work for some firm where it also wasn't allowed to install.


So within a few days we were chatting for hours on Gmail about all sorts of things and our relationship really bonded more closely then when we were actually with each other. This I would say is an achievement in itself to get people closer but I would say the best thing it has ever done was to save those sweet moments like history...those smiles and laughs and fights. Every time I read the chat history it is like re-living the past. Now that we have broken up, those sweet feelings still linger in heart and Gmail helps me remember all those which was close to me. Thank you for making my moments memorable. Maybe I can even show this to my grand children and say "see how romantic your grand dad has been". People say you wont forget anything love, but I would say Gmail helped me remember every sentence which I ever spoke that makes my love complete and immemorial.



Chandra Kanth, Software Engineer
India

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My friend offered me an invite to try Gmail a few years ago, and it has been smooth sailing ever since. Having changed profession to a Flight Attendant, I am not only away from my home (hometown: Philadelphia, now live in the Twin Cities), but am always on the road (or sky). I can send emails to my contacts and keep abreast of what's current with their lives through the organized format that Gmail offers. Thanks for keeping me 'centered' in one area even though I am jet-setting to the far reaches of the world!



Delon R. Narain, Flight Attendant
Minneapolis, MN

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I am obsessed with my Scottish heritage. I am always looking for ways to make it more a part of my every-day life. I've written several emails about it to friends, and I guess Gmail picked up on that. One of the ads I found in Gmail led me to a site where you can buy land in Scotland for a very cheap price and officially attain the title of "Laird." Needless to say, I was absolutely thrilled.



Moses, Student
Rutherford, New Jersey

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With Gmail, I'm able to keep in touch with some of my friends thousands of miles away in South Korea. Gmail has made my life easier.



Tristan Kim, 7th Grade Student
Philadelphia, PA

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Gmail has saved me about $520 over the last 2 and a half years. I haven't had to buy a printer, and therefore I haven't had to buy cartridges for it. I use Gmail to send my completed assignments to myself, and I print them out at school. It's worked wonderfully for me. Especially when it comes to printing out 10 page essays or 20 page articles, who pays for it? My school!



Matt Pullman, Student
New Jersey

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I have used Gmail for my personal email for well over a year, and when it came to starting the The Helping Hands non-profit organization, I chose Gmail again. Because we work with parents over the internet more than anything, the email that we use is important. Gmail has helped me stay organized and kept my inbox simple. The best part of Gmail? It's powered by my favorite search!



Ashley Clark & The Helping Hands - volunteers to help parents nationwide
Bensons, Arizona

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When Gmail first came out I was in the Marines. I was invited from a friend back home, as it was still by invite only. I loved it. The large attachment limit allowed me to send pics back and forth with the family back home. After a few weeks of using it, I figured it would be great for the whole platoon to get a Gmail account prior to going to Iraq. It took some time, I think 3 weeks to hunt down enough invites, but I did. The platoon was off to Iraq and loving Gmail. The Marines had a limit of 5M attachments and a mean firewall. So Gmail allowed all 30 members of my platoon to keep in close touch with their families back in the states. That was 2 years ago and we all still keep in touch with Gmail!! Thank you for what you did with this service. I bet you had no clue you were serving your countries troops in such a great way!



Brian Kitt, IT Specialist
Honolulu, HI

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When I was stationed in Japan serving in the U.S. Air Force a couple years ago I met some new friends and started a band called "Mercury Descends". After a short two years of music writing and playing shows I received new orders to Wichita, KS leaving the band behind. It was a bit depressing because I was leaving all the hardwork creating music, and new friendships behind. Before I left Japan we vowed that we would do everything we could to stay in touch and keep writing music any way possible until we could meet back up in the future and give the pipe dream musician thing a real go. Over the years that the band was separated living in 4 different states, and 2 continents we were still creating music by using Gmail. My bassist and I quickly realized with the amount of data we were able to transfer with Gmail we could quickly & easily email song ideas back and forth creating music in a different but highly successful way. In August 2007 we completed our first CD entitled "Foreign Protocol" which couldn't have been completed without Gmail...



Blake Rockwood, USAF / Musician

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I use Gmail like a USB key. All my college notes are stored online and it means that wherever I go I have access to all my important documents.



Oisín Collin, Student
Ireland

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Gmail has basically acted for me as a store for my personal pictures. I have the assurance that my account will continue on even if for some reason I don't sign in for more than 30 days. And the large storage size enables me to keep records.



Mustafa, Admin Manager
Pakistan

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I hope I don't jinx myself, but I have had Gmail for 6 months and I haven't received 1 spam message yet, NOT ONE!



Joe Graham, Student
New York

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When I first heard about Gmail, I thought, "Here's another search engine with an email address" only later to find out that it was an email address with a search engine. Using Gmail, I have been able to upload docs, email articles to myself (and keep them all together!!) to be printed later, see that my adviser had really emailed me five times (oops!) and all the while keep in touch with my close friends, and seen only emails that I want to (yay for spam filter!!)



Grad Student
Cedar Falls, IA

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I was extremely nervous when my girlfriend of 4 months suggested that I cook dinner for her. I'm no novice in the kitchen, but her dietary needs leave much to be desired. One thing she does eat a lot of is spam. However, it's difficult to find a cookbook anywhere that includes a diverse set of recipes using spam, the other white meat. Then I discovered Gmail. In your spam folder, I've found several delicious recipes that include spam as a key ingredient.



Harold Rosengarten, Paralegal
New York, NY

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Because of Gmail, my 8 hours a day at work isn't so horrid. Have you ever hated a job so much and just watched the clock until your next break? That's me. But now with Gmail, in between service calls I am able to chat with my other friends. The best part about Gmail chat is that you don't have to download it. And since it's frowned upon to download chat programs onto your work computer, I feel like I'm sliding in under the radar. It's great! So on my breaks I can talk to people friends outside of work. Gmail is a breath of fresh air in my stale day.



Summer, Boring Insurance Customer Service
Green Bay, WI

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Gmail is the one place for my boyfriend and I to share email, chat, voice, docs, and calendars. We really do use them on a daily basis. Because we don't live in the same city (and are rarely home at that), we've come to rely on Gmail chat as our primary method for talking from just about anywhere for over a year now with great reliability (and we're both in software/IT!).



Brooke Manly, Business Analyst
Austin, TX

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A couple of friends (4 to be exact) and myself would get together on weekends and play a game we called "Link". Basically, one guy would tell a joke and the next guy would have to continue it with a proper segue. Now, with Gmail and Google Groups we were able to take our weekend game to cyberspace and play all week long. With the classic "Why'd the Golfer bring an extra pair of pants to the game - just in case he got a 'hole in one'", Fred started the chain about 2 years ago... and the same chain is still going strong. We could easily see the chain of progress and how we ended up now talking about snow plows from Fred's old 'Hole in One.' Thanks to Gmail I have something to look forward to, not just on the weekend at one of our houses, but right in my inbox all week long. My only concern now: "How is it that the snowplow driver gets to work in the morning?!"



Bill Rogers, Contractor
Valley Village, CA

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I use Gmail and other Google tools to plan my great American aviation adventure around America in a unique flying contraption called an ultralight trike: http://trikingaroundamerica.com. Other Gmail users can join me on different legs and tell what it means to be American let us take Gmail to new heights.



Chandu, Management Consultant
Washington, D. C.

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I use Gmail with Google Calender and Google Docs for my projects. The best thing for me is the colored labels that have helped me a lot in organizing my emails in my inbox, and the filters that I can manage what comes in.



Taylor Englund
Cameron

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I was introduced to Gmail through my two sons and after hesitation to make a change, I accepted the offer to join and have been delighted ever since. The feature of being able to track an email by using search with just one word has saved my butt many, many times. This includes airline e-tickets recovery as well as appearing to be very clever when remembering birthdays and anniversaries...



Karen Street, retired
Spring, Texas

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I am constantly chastised for how unorganized I am in my daily life: my room, my office, my notebooks...but to counter that...I always show people my Gmail account...I have labels, I even have labels cross referencing other labels. Everything is labeled so I can find ANYTHING instantaneously. AND it looks cool with all the colors.



Courtney, Student
Madison, WI

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I am doing a big group project in history class, and thanks to Gmail I am able to organize everything together, and easily provide links to my group.



Holly, Student
California

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I created a Gmail address for my daughter the same week she was born. My wife and I send emails to her on random things like her favorite books at the moment; our perspectives on important things that are going on in the world and things that she says we think are cute. It's like a virtual scrapbook that she will read in the future. We're also keeping copies because we suspect she'll get annoyed with us when she's sixteen and decide to delete all of the emails. She is now four and has about 100 unread emails.



Brian Desmond, Software Marketing
Mill Valley, CA

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I work full time and go to school full time. Gmail is perfect for chatting with friends, coworkers, and schoolmates. I literally use it as my one and only source to stay in touch with the world. I have Gmail up and running for 10 hours a day.



Chaya, FT student/FT worker
Maryland

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I used Gmail to meet my fiancée. We worked together and she was in the market for a new computer and needed an email account, too. I told her how much I loved my Gmail account and when she got her new computer I invited her to Gmail. We started to chat using Gmail. Now we are just a few months away from our wedding and will be using Gmail as a way to RSVP and make maps for our wedding and reception sites.



Justin, RN
Lincoln, NE

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I love Gmail because you can email your friends and family and plus you can chat with others while you check your Gmail. It's really great and exciting, plus not to mention fun, too.



Heather Tollison, Internet Marketer/Restaurant person
North Fort Myers

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I have had the best email time ever since I joined Gmail a few years back. I have got no spam ever! Even in my spam folder. Very easy to use. No ads or pop ups, quick to open and sign out.



Wolf, Photographer
Texas

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I love that I can chat with my wife and other family members while I am deployed overseas. I have not seen my wife or 2 year old daughter for about 6 months. My wife is able to send me videos and pictures. Now that the limit is up t 20 MB on attachments, I am able to send pictures back and forth. Gmail has greatly improved my morale and welfare while I have been over here.



Steven Martinez, Military
Iraq

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I recently suffered from a mental episode that resulted in some hospitalization. After being bamboozled by hospital folk, I had to get out, get back to school, and get my life on track. I could not have done this without the power of Gmail. Without the color-coding, the ability to view entire conversation strings, the ability to chat... without these organizational and communication features provided by Gmail, I would never have gotten back into the fray so quickly, well organized and prepared.



David J. Derdiger, Student/Musician/Shaman
University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

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Just when I think Gmail has topped all the others, you go and do it again. Now I can sign into AIM through my Gmail chat. It's insane! On top of that, I simply love the way all my mail and messages are organized the way I WANT THEM TO BE.



Christine Itwaru, Marketing & Business Development
NYC

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I've been using Gmail since 2005 and found it has come a long way. Regardless of using it via POP, IMAP, or web-based, Gmail has always kept me in contact with everyone or anyone I needed to.



Jonathan Rose, College Student
Durham, NH

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The great thing about Gmail is that it does a lot without looking busy. I get a lot of shipments with the business I run. One of my favorite little features of Gmail is how if I get a shipping confirmation email with a tracking number, it shows up on the side of the email...



Mister Mark Davis. Entrepreneur (sneaker arbitrage)
New York City

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I was able to set up a separate Gmail account for my department heads to email their reports to me. Using labels, I can archive the reports and find them again in the future quite easily. I can access the reports any where, any time, from any computer. I use it like a hard drive; it's safe, it's secure, it's simple, it's clean, IT IS GMAIL!



John Marino, Financial Controller
Chicago, USA

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Several volunteers and I use Gmail to communicate with other volunteers and to promote our work - and our adoptable cats & kittens.



David Bryant, Cat Rescue
Washington DC

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I just found a feature that has changed the way I email: spell check in the subject line! To sum it up, Gmail seems to keep secretly adding features that make it more and more useful all the time.



Curtiss Waters, Artist
Sarasota

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When I started my women's health and fitness blog about 3 months ago, I needed a simple email address to manage comments through the site. Gmail helps me keep my blog emails separate from my school work at my school address. In addition to the simplicity and ease of Gmail, my inbox is never too full and I can use the search feature to find old emails quickly.



Dana, College Student
Grand Rapids, Michigan

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Gmail has provided the ease of chatting and mailing at a single environment. All my friends and I are using Gmail and we are happy that we can chat and send and receive messages at a same time.



Manjoor Kapoor, Software Programmer
India

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With Gmail, all my mail is always with me, of course without any spam in my inbox, which is really great! I also have my important documents and photographs online, whenever I need them. And, of course, all my distant relatives, friends and colleagues are online, always available to chat, discuss and share life with.



Shabbir Poonawala, Social Service
Nagpur, India

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I am a law student at the University of Alberta. Getting a spot in certain classes can be very difficult. I get emails forwarded to me when a spot in a class I want to take opens up. I've used Gmail to forward those notifications to my cell phone, so I don't have to be furiously checking my email all the time.



Jonathan, Law Student
Edmonton, Canada

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I've never had my own printer in three and a half years in college... I originally used other email services to backup/send myself documents to print, but they were always too slow. I'd have to wait longer than I wanted as it passed through the tubes of the great internet, all the while becoming increasingly late for class. Gmail had me at hello, and I haven't looked back since. As a master procrastinator, I would work right up to the very wee-last minutes of a deadline, before needing to desperately sprint off to class with paper clutched in hand. So, it became a ritual every time I had a paper due: type it all up the night before on Google Documents, Gmail it to myself (and star it, of course! How else would I find it again?), run to the computer lab and proceed to format it, print it, email a copy to myself, and run off to class. Three and a half years of this, you'd think I'd of learned my lesson now. As I graduate from college, and the world around me becomes increasingly more technological by the second and the Earth runs out of trees to produce printer paper, one day my printer predicament may not even exist anymore as I simply email my papers to Professors. And one day there will be another poor college student who somehow manages...all with Gmail.



Sarah, Student
Oakland, CA

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I am working with Accenture and my brother stays in U.S.A. We exchange our thoughts, but this could only be possible with the help of Gmail emails and chats. Due to the time difference I'm not able to be in touch with him. But now this lovable facility by Google has made me have RAKHI also online with my brother. Thanks for keeping the love in the relation alive.



Mansi Mehra, Software Engineer
Mumbai

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This is the only email address where I haven't been bogged down with spam because the spam filter is amazing.


Nathan Atwood, Account Manager/Corporate Sales
Denver, CO

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Since my sister is going to school in New Zealand and I can't see her, Gmail has helped me keep in touch with her by chat... I also love how Gmail keeps updating and updating their program and now it has cool features like talking to AIM people on Gmail chat, which has been very useful!



Mitchell Horwood, Student
Sacramento. CA

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I am a 13 year old girl, and I am home-schooled, so I don't get to see my friends much. I use Gmail to IM my friends since my mom and dad won't let me have any other IM service.



Casey, Student
Texas

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I created a project called Doodle Collage where anyone that visits the website can submit a "doodle request" for a large drawing that I'm creating (http://www.ry-guy.com/projects/interactive/doodleCollage1/). I use Gmail to put all of these requests in a label. I can star the ones I've drawn already and I can instantly see the people I've replied to, how many requests there have been, etc. This would have been a real mess otherwise. This was a nice, quick solution instead of having to figure out a way to database all the requests.



Ryan Terry, Illustrator & Designer
Houston, TX USA

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My friends and I have exchanged over 3500 emails on the same discussion thread. We have measured how busy our lives are from the time it takes for us to reset another thread. Every so often we do a zeitgeist of sorts on past emails exchanged. This Gmail thread as kept us close to each other for the past few years. We have been in different cities, countries, time zones, and in different stages of our lives. Each one of us checks Gmail five times a day just to see if someone else has sent a 'keep alive' even when we don't have time to send one ourselves. I think it would be safe to say that without "The Ongoing Conversation" (name of our conversation thread) we would be just people who once were very good friends.



Vaibhav Gadodia, Software Engineer
India

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I became a Gmail user shortly before liquidating my belongings and becoming a full-time traveler. I've traveled continuously for over two years, visited countless cities in nearly 40 countries across the globe, and Gmail, like my backpack, has been by my side the entire time. My time in public Internet cafés costs me money, and Gmail has consistently pleased with its ability to efficiently facilitate communication while I'm abroad, and keep spam out of my inbox -- which would otherwise cost me money to sift through in the café. I've kept a travelogue that continues to grow in popularity, and have regularly used Gmail's 'Check Spelling' feature to catch typos and highlight spelling errors. Gmail makes my life easier by knowing that any country that I can reach Google from, I can read my email.



Craig Heimburger, Writer/ Photographer/ Nomad
Traveling in Lima, Peru

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I had toyed with the idea of using web-based email exclusively for a long time, but no services had the features I needed to realistically work the way I needed to. When I sold one of my online businesses earlier this year, the new owner invited me to Gmail. Hey... he just paid thousands of dollars for my business; the least I could do, right? So I switched to Gmail and now use it exclusively for all my email accounts. I have stopped using all my other services because Gmail just makes more sense. My files are with me when I travel, I can open documents on whatever machine I am on. I use Gmail chat daily to stay in touch with coworkers. I'm at the point now to where I couldn't live without Gmail. It is truly the most logical web-based mail service out there... Gmail has made me more productive and saved me countless hours of file-sorting, searching, and program-launching. My computer thanks you, my business thanks you, and I thank you.



Tim Locklear, Online Marketing Consultant
Oklahoma City, OK USA

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Gmail allows me to keep in touch with all of my friends who live far away in the cities and towns I have lived in. It has also saved me on many occasions, such as the time my friend sent me an important email, and I wasn't able to get online for a while. Whereas other email services delete your messages, and even your account after a while, Gmail is strong and steady through and through.



Alex Madison, Student
Georgia

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With Gmail I send myself recipes. With the great searching, I can find any recipe quickly, and have them readily available even if I am away from home. I have a PC right by the kitchen door, so I just follow it right off the screen. And, I now have data service on my cell phone, so if I am at the grocery store and trying to decide what I need for dinner, I just pull up my Gmail and find the recipe I am thinking of using, and I'm all set!



Mary Beth
Maplewood, MN

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I use Gmail with my cellphone as a personal log book. I text my weight to Gmail and I also send pictures from my cell phone to my account. I have a running log of what I was doing or a gift idea in a easy to find central location. With plenty of storage and easy search I know someday I can look back on it as my digital memory of my life.



Tom Maioli, Biotechnology
Upstate NY

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I love Gmail's archiving feature. I pay all my bills online and whenever I come up to a password or account number I don't remember or need to refer to an old email that I recieved prior; all I have
do is type in a word or two in the search box and it pops up.



Donny Bishop, BART Train Operator
Vallejo California

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My best friend -- my Mom -- invited me to Gmail in January 2005. We lived less than an hour away from each other, but she had chronic pulmonary disease and so we couldn't get together as much as we would like, and she often had trouble talking on the phone. But we would Gmail each other every day, anywhere from 2 to 20 times. My husband joked that I should just get a video camera on the computer, because I would share every trivial detail of my day with her, and vice versa. She also enjoyed pointing out the funny ads that Gmail would provide for her. I never noticed them unless she pointed them out to me! Sometimes we would talk about bizarre topics just to see what ads would come up. My mom passed away in April of this year. I miss her terribly, but now I use Gmail to keep in touch with my Dad -- 2 to 20 times a day! I love Gmail because I can go back and read my conversations with my mom, and it makes me smile to relive all those days. I also use the search feature to find things like recipes she shared with me, etc. I've had two other free email accounts, and with both accounts I have lost all my past messages at some point. With Gmail I can have these conversations with my mom to re-read for a long time to come.



Karen
West Virginia

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I'm diabetic. The day I was diagnosed, I opened a new Gmail account to help me track my blood glucose level, weight, and overall health stats. Whenever I get a reading or have another physical, I just email myself the stats. I can pull them up from anywhere (with a connection) on the planet including my doctor's office, or at my sister's house...It's helped me be a healthier me.



David Medberry

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As a graduate student, I no longer need to carry floppy disks or flash drives -- I email my research material to myself. The growing storage makes it possible to send as many files as possible. Gmail also makes it possible to send my homework to myself and print it on campus before class --I love it. For the Arts and Culture section of the Cleveland State University Vindicator Magazine, I use Gmail to send my content list to my Art Director and the entire editorial staff has Gmail accounts. I send huge files, which makes our job so much easier. Being able to chat and see my colleagues on-line is a wonderful feature as is the ability to label my email by category. I can chat with colleagues before leaving for campus because I can see them online. Google products have changed the way I do research and I can't wait to see what the future holds. Gmail is one of the most important products I've used since going on line in 1988.



Charlotte Morgan, Graduate Student/Writer
Cleveland, Ohio

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I have been using Gmail to organize a knitting pattern book I'm creating. I can tag people who email me to be test knitters and whenever I need a test knitter I just bring up all the people who emailed me. Combined with the use of Google Docs, I am able to type up a knitting pattern, share it with my pattern maker and have it tested and we can all collaborate easily.



Hadley Fierlinger, Knitwear Designer
New Zealand

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Gmail has sure changed my life. Before I was be hindered by separate email addresses for university and personal, and the lack of space the competition offered. When I got Gmail it all changed. As soon as I found out my university allowed forwarding of their emails to another email address, I redirected to Gmail, and put a label on those incoming mail. Thanks to Gmail's sophisticated search algorithm, finding old uni emails is a breeze. No need to ask friends about mass mailed messages, no need to access the uni email account physically and search through pages of emails, it's all there in Gmail ready to be accessed at any time. It has also made me a better organized person.



Mark Zita, University student
Brisbane, Australia

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I use Gmail to keep in touch with my friends in the UK. I feel without Gmail it would be quite difficult. I also get to chat with them (unfortunately with the time difference I have to stay up until 1 AM) and use the cute little emoticons. With the amount of data you can attach to an email at Gmail, I can send my friends videos and pictures - and even slide shows - to keep them up to date.


Rebecca, Receptionist
Sydney, Australia

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I've been using Gmail for a while now, and more so lately since my sister has moved to Mexico. It's great to be able to chat with her, and email, and send as many pictures back and forth without worrying about space in my inbox.



Milena, Student
London, Ontario Canada

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I have multiple email addresses that I've collected over the years - previous personal accounts, school, etc... and even though I don't use all of them very much, important emails come through from time to time. I absolutely love how I can send all of them directly to Gmail, yet still keep them separate by labeling them and using the skip-the-inbox feature. It has DRASTICALLY reduced the amount of time it takes me to check my email daily, and makes my life much more organized. I also love the drop-box that allows me choose which address to send each message from.



Brian Luke, Medical Student
Newark, NJ

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I am a police officer and in the increasingly digital world, I use digital documents in my work all the time. Ever since I began using Gmail, I can save every single document I create in my email which has the added benefit of being search-able. Why is that important? I go to court on cases that I have worked on sometimes six, even eight months later and when documents get lost (like they did just recently), I can pull up what I have saved and reference it for court. That sounds small, but if you were a victim and it was your court case, it would seem a lot more important! Gmail keeps me organized and allows me to be a better officer.



Aaron, Police
Pasadena, MD

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I just watched your video at gmail.com/yourstory and was really shocked to see that my freshman ChemE group was mentioned in the third part! I remember when my friend sent that email out. Very cool! Thanks again for the help!



Scott, Student
IIT

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I've been using Gmail since it was first available... several years later, and I still LOVE IT!! My fiancee is currently living and working stateside, and I convinced him to sign up for an account. His work blocks other chatting programs, but they haven't caught Gmail! So we spend eight hours a night, five nights a week, chatting and missing each other!



Melissa Richards, Self-Employed Day Care Operator
Lethbridge, Alberta

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I was working in a company using my 1 year Optional Practical Training that I received after graduating with a masters. As the year was getting to an end, I started shopping for an immigration lawyer in order to process my H1-B visa. I emailed a local attorney and met with him and a couple of others, but did not like them and I thought they were asking too much money. One day at work I was checking my Gmail and I saw an ad in the Web Clip that says "H1B Do It Yourself Kit for $49.95". I was surprised as it was so cheap, so I went directly to that website and contacted them and did some research to see if they were real; and apparently they were. I processed my H1-B with them, and now my green card for at least 50% less than what the local attorneys were going to charge. Cool, huh?



Ahmad Farhat, Software Developer
Miami, FL

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I got Gmail quite a while back. I had dial-up internet and didn't have time to load all these other large email browsers. It was a relief to get Gmail and find that it had already loaded and was very efficient with useful buttons and links. I can now chat with my friends who may be across the country, yet I can stay connected better than any other chat system online.



Kelsey McGlashan, High School Freshman
Ripton, VT

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Gmail's spam filter is so awesome, it has changed my life. I used to have my own domain name, with an email address associated with it. The last few years, though, my spam had gotten SO bad I didn't even want to check that account, so I've slowly been convincing all my friends to write me at my Gmail account instead. But to demonstrate how much better your spam filter is than my hosting company's: I would get 100 - 150 spam emails a day. You heard it right. Ridiculous. Since Gmail lets you forward email to an account, I set it up to forward. Now I may only get one spam per day that isn't caught. It's amazing.



Tracey, UI Designer
Denver, Colorado

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This is not just a story, this is a page from my book of life. My true love - my first love....I still remember the day when I met her on Gmail Chat. I never knew she would walk in to my life. I saw her online in my Gmail Chat, but I never bothered to message her. Slowly I started noticing her more...I browsed her orkut profile through her Gmail Account, then I started messaging her...she responded. It's been almost one year and we still use Gmail Chat. Now she is my best buddy...my shadow...my First love. We are not Romeo, not Juliet...We are a new history.



Thomas K Sam
Kerala, India

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What I never really imagined that I would come to truly appreciate about Gmail is the archive it keeps of all your conversations. Our daughter was born July 18th of this year. I loved discussing the ins and outs of her development, my concerns, all the details of caring for her while my husband was away at work. September 8th, she stopped breathing and her heart stopped. She was resuscitated and life flighted to the hospital, but still died a week later. Gmail was my source of keeping in contact with friends and loved ones with updates through the week. It was my way of asking for prayers and their way of letting us know they were offering them. And now, Gmail is a sort of life history for our little daughter. I can easily search the chat history and past emails, and easily see the story of her precious life written in the day to day moments we shared. Thank you for this gift.



Marie, Homemaker
Utah

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Email was just another technology until Gmail came. Now it's a revolution. Before trying Gmail I thought email was about just sending and receiving messages but now its my central base of information. It has changed my lifestyle, my academic grades and even my career. From spam filtering to labels, I am now able to organize 5000+ emails easily. If you haven't tried Gmail then you must be really missing something.



Sankaranand, Student/Web Developer
Pondicherry, India

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I use Gmail to run my book selling business. This is a hobby based on my true love - books. I buy books and sell them on Amazon.com. I have found quite a few gems, for example books that I buy for a ten cents or quarter and are listed on Amazon for $40 and $50. I have recently started to list and sell books for our public library. I find that it's pretty exciting to make money for a worthy cause. I used to use another email service, but discontinued it after I figured out that the price of free email was a lot of pop-ups and too many tracking cookies. I get much more spam mail from my paid address than I do from my free Gmail address. I appreciate that Google offers great features with no hassle.



Mary Book, Engineer
Washington

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My brother is in Iraq with the U.S. Army and talking on the phone is pretty expensive and not very timely seeing as he's halfway across the world. We would try to catch each other using other services, but it was only Gmail Chat that put us in connection with each other in real time. We've been able to exchange travel itineraries and birthday greetings from across the miles thanks to Gmail Chat.



Lalarene, Sister
Los Angeles, CA

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I use Gmail for everything! My favorite is my personal email, where I gets a hundreds of spam messages, but with Gmail I don't have to see any of them. My friends and I use Gmail for our podcast, website and my advice column.



Elly Pastor, Student
Louisville, Kentucky

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...I am a college student and have had a steady girlfriend of 2 years. The best part of Gmail is being able to read emails she sent me a year ago and reflecting on the experiences her and I had together. She split up with me just recently, but because of Gmail I'll always have the little tidbits of love and support she sent me to keep me going.



Ravin Kumar, Student
Huntington Beach

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My boyfriend and I started our online friendship, initially through an online chat messenger. But it proved to be too cumbersome as both of us had to be online at the same time to be able to communicate with each other. This was a challenging task with him in Singapore doing Army and me in Western Australia, Perth doing my Bachelor of Arts in Mass Communications. After other futile attempts, we decided emailing is THE WAY to go. With both of us on Gmail, it doesn't take us long to start on our emailing journey as we are close to 4000km apart. We sent very, very lengthy emails to each other, chatting with one another through the emails, long before Gmail Chat came along. I think we had come far. In the months that followed, close to 6 months, before we finally met up, we had sent close to 1000 emails. By then we had built our basis of each other's character and likes & dislikes on Gmail, what an amazing feat! When we met up, it was the very first time we saw each other in the flesh. The connection is so strong between us! And as they say, the rest is history. We are still going strong and preparing our future lives together. You are a wonderful middle-person connecting us together!



Tiffany Yoong, Senior Officer -SIA Engineering Company Limited
Singapore

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I used to live in Eureka, California where my brother and I were probably two of the first people to get Gmail...My best friend Justin Roller and I started exchanging emails and then we were virtually (both computer-wise and "being actually such in almost every respect") inseparable. One day my house got robbed and from there on my life in Eureka started to spiral, which ultimately led to my family moving to Portland, OR. when I moved Justin and I created huge conversations that lasted for months and we often talked for hours. Although Gmail made it close, emailing wasn't the same as hanging out, so we needed something that we could do over a long distance/ time period that only we did. So we made "Google Earth I Spy". We took a screen shot of some random place in the world (cutting out the lat/long) and every day using Gmail we would give one clue about this place, ex: "Russia, north, lake, _____ was mayor in 1865..." until we finally found the place we were looking for. It's been a few years since I moved but we still play "I Spy".



David Galle, Student
Portland, OR

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When I was a kid, there was no Gmail. I grew up creating tons of email accounts on different sites, just to make sure I get all my messages (yes, I used to love forwards back then). There were flash ads, there was irritating eye-catching animation, there was a plethora of useless junk (SPAM) with important emails hidden between them...not to forget those ".exe" files having viruses which were not detected. Then "Do No Evil" comes up with something unique, simple and ground-breaking. Just like the Google homepage, Gmail was sleek, clean, uncluttered and it did what you wanted it to do, no non-sense. I have been using Gmail for the last 3 years, and I simply have not found anything that is more useful for me when I am on the net. Whenever I log into Gmail, I always remember one line I read somewhere - "Email, Meet Gmail".



Zeiger, Software Engineer
Mumbai, India

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As a student and a full time secretary, managing all my accounts online is vital. I have three email addresses, all of which I manage easily with one Gmail sign-in. I haven't been able to get on AIM in a long time after graduation, because I didn't have time, but now, with the new integration, I am able to transform my Gmail chat to include AIM and see what everyone is up to in seconds. I love Gmail's archive ability and unlimited space... I have a phrase I tell everyone over and over: Gmail's the greatest thing that has ever happened to my organizational life!



Hannah, Student/Secretary
Virginia

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I am a student, studying Computer Science, from Egypt. I am the head of many communities and have many responsibilities, projects & tasks that must be done, & of course, people I must communicate with to organize all these matters. Plus I have multiple emails accounts. You can imagine how much of a disaster my life was, and the amount of time I was wasting to check all those emails, & reply and sort... simply, it was a real problem. Honestly, with Gmail, life is now easier & wonderful. Now all these emails are in one place. I check my mails from my main Gmail account and I can reply from wherever, and compose, receive, and do everything from just one email. Awesome!



Magdy Wageeh, Student
Egypt

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I just simply love the chat feature of Gmail. It enables my girlfriend and I to keep in touch at home and at work easily without installing some other third party software. The most impressive thing is when I am using Google Talk and she uses the standard Gmail AIM chat and we are still enabled to talk to one another over the different platforms.



Devaroux Jacobs, Programmer
Cape Town, South Africa

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I love Gmail because all the important emails come to me but no spam! Also, integration with all other Google services is incredible. Gmail is, by far, the most uber-email service on this planet. I am a college webmaster and I will be pushing this product for our official college email.



Takuya Shimamura, Webmaster
Vermont

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I used to run various groups during high school and using Gmail to quickly email to my group members was key.



Rachael, Student
New Hampshire

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When I switched from my previous email service, I was not very involved on the Internet. I didn't use my email very much, and was very nervous about the whole thing. Since using Gmail, though, I have become much more involved, and my need for a good email address has grown. As it is, Gmail has remained a good and useful email provider. I love the way Gmail makes it easy to store and find many emails, and the way Gmail makes it easy to organize things. I am especially glad of this last part, as I am not very good at organizing. And, over all, I am very impressed that Gmail has continued to grow and try to find ways to improve.



Sara, Student
USA

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Gmail has made it much easier for me to manage all my email by adding multiple accounts and adding labels to each account. Also I love how it threads emails into conversations, which makes it much easier to understand the situation that is being discussed. And Gmail chat helps me to talk to people I don't normally see very often and I can do it all from my inbox, which is so great.



Derek, Student
Cincinnati

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I was perfectly content managing my email at home and at work, doing my best to keep the versions matched. Then my boss, the president of our company, finally switched to Gmail (we are a bunch of software engineers, so we should not shy away from things technical), and so I gave it a try. His issue was becoming my issue - keeping messages in sync - which was not easy given the volume of email we receive. Now I am a full blown Gmail junkie! I have invited other colleagues, my kids, and hopefully soon, my wife (who doesn't like change either).



Henry Dudek, VP of Operations
Virginia

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My company's office headquarters has a firewall that does not allow me to access AOL Instant Messenger directly. So, for the past 8 months, since I moved to the headquarters office, I haven't be able to chat with one friend that I used to speak to daily. Now, with AIM built into Gmail Chat, I can once again keep in touch with my friend half way across the country.



Stephanie, Lawyer/Librarian
Minnesota

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I switched to Gmail a couple of years ago because I was getting 100+ emails per day, mostly comprised of spam. I would have to sort through all of my spam mail just to find an email from a friend...it annoyed me, as I rarely share my email address while online. I stumbled upon Gmail, and I haven't been unhappy with it at all. In fact, I like that I can keep all of my emails (as I've gone back and searched though many times for specific ones), and documents and information all in one place. It helps me to be organized and not feel as though I have to dig around for stuff... It really did change the way I email, as I can find every conversation regarding any particular topic with a few clicks of my mouse. It saves me time and that's important!



Jen Lyons, Advertising Executive
New York

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I only began using a computer only a few years ago... Now I continually invite contacts to set up Gmail accounts because it is so easy to use, even for older people like me.



Roger Brown, Retired Professor
Chiangmai, Thailand

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Gmail has changed the way I email, as contrived as it sounds. I have a university email address that only has 15 megabytes of space. Not enough, you guys realize that. So I have my uni email forwarded to my Gmail, and have it set up to email from Gmail with my edu email. I have not logged into the uni email account directly in probably a couple of years. Brilliant!



Jacob Bernstein, Student
Kent, OH

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Thank you thank you thank you for the color label feature! Now I can remove all the crayon marks from my screen! Wishes do come true!



Martha Seikaly, Self-Employed Trouble-Maker
Tuscon, AZ

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Once my friend was on campus at Caltech. The internal network there broke down (something that happens even at the top-notch educational and research institutions). However, the computers still had access to the Internet. My friend had a huge (somewhere near 12 MB) data file on some important research (he is a physicist) which he wanted to get on another computer to someone else. What did he do? He emailed it to himself! Guess what email service he used... Morale? Use Gmail instead of your USB flash drive.



Kushal Hada, Student
Texas

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I like Gmail very much and went to it initially because we travel a lot and I wanted to have an email address on the web so I could pick up my emails from any machine. I feel it is the best so far that I have used.



Gayle Mortimer, retired
Crossfield, Alberta

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The new colored labels allow me to indulge my obsessive compulsive organizing to new heights of near-satisfaction.



Max, Animator
New York, NY

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I absolutely adore the new colored label feature. It's excellent -- particularly for someone with poor vision in a badly-lit office. (Not that I've ever spent time checking my personal email at work. Um. Never. Not me.)



Caroline, Publishing
Location: My Cubicle

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I love Gmail because at work, message blocking sites don't detect chat like they with do other services, so I can still chat at work, which I need to keep sane. I especially talk to my boyfriend. Its also nice that Gmail logs the chats, so one day down the line, I can look back at our conversations and see how much we've evolved in our relationship. It's history in the making!



Regina, Student
Torrance, CA

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To keep our wedding planning organized and the communication lines open, we set up a shared email account and use nearly every feature Gmail offers: labels for different wedding party roles (like "Groomsmen" or "Parents"). We also used Google Docs for itineraries and budget revisions; Picasa Web to share our Shower/Honeymoon/Wedding photos; Google Maps to show the location of the venues; and Blogger to keep our guests and wedding party current on the progress of the planning. Everything went SO smoothly - everyone was thoroughly informed, and Gmail kept me sane through the whole thing. My Mom and Dad were so convinced that Gmail was the was to go, they even set up accounts after the wedding! I guess in a nutshell, Gmail helped me get married!



Lacey Schexnayder Pyle, Graphic Artist/Ad designer
Baton Rouge, LA

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I opened up a small business writing resumes in Puerto Rico. Every time I get a new customer, I send them an invite to open up a Gmail account. This way I can chat with them if I have immediate questions about their resumes. I also tell them about the great filtering of spam that occurs, folders that can be organized for job searches, and a professional looking email address on their resume. I love finding new functions with Gmail including the new smiley, group chat, and color labels you've added. Thanks for making my life easier and enable me to provide immediate customer service.



Lucilla, Small Business Owner
Coamo, Puerto Rico

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I am now using Gmail as my primary method for getting email from all my accounts. There are a lot of them, for personal use, business use from two different small ventures of my own, and business operations email for two clients. By using Gmail to collect all of them I can see the whole picture, no matter where I am. I used to have quite a challenge synchronizing the mail on email clients residing on several computers. Using a web application that is secure, and incidentally has the best spam protection I've come across, makes my life much easier. Thanks for a great solution.



Chuck Gregory, Publisher/Editor/Consultant
Fort Lauderdale

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Gmail keeps me in touch with all my family no matter where they are. My son was traveling in Europe this summer and it was so cool because I went online and there he was in the chat box, so I could talk to him in Prague. I love it! My sister is in Florida, and we also use Gmail...It makes the world come right into my house and lets me keep in touch with everyone I love.



Constance, Teacher
Vermont

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I just gave my boyfriend a colored label. I just love Gmail. Combined with my Mac it makes things so much more organized and fun. And it just works.



Valerie A, Artist
Netherlands

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I've saved I-don't-know-how-much-money on my cell phone bill because I chat inside Gmail instead.



Gloria, Mom
Arkansas

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It has made me really happy that with Gmail I'm able to still talk to my cousin down in Georgia and to my friends that I can only see at school.



Jordan
Apex, NC

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Gmail has helped me a lot, especially receiving emails from my friends and relatives around the world because Gmail is so fast to open & easy to use.



Romeo Asistin, CAD Designer
Saudi Arabia

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When I got a new laptop, I HATED the included mail application. I have had a Gmail account for a good while but I just recently discovered that I could get my POP mail with Gmail and have been using it about 2 weeks. Already there is much less spam, without even applying filters.



Stephen Chadwick, Dentist
Charleston, SC

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Gmail has completely change the way I email. I've been an avid Gmail user since the "early" days. Ever since I first logged in, I've found it very easy and simple to use. But not only that, it also provides many of the more powerful features that us "techies" yearn for. Things like IMAP access, multiple accounts, integrated chat, and, of course, TONS of space for messages! I love how Gmail integrates into my Google Calendar and the way that conversations are grouped together instead of having individual messages for each reply. I have been, am, and will continue to be a huge Gmail fan and supporter. Every chance I get, I recommend Gmail to friends and family.



Dan Bunyard, Information Systems Technician
Columbus, OH

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I just wanted to thank you guys (and dolls) for doing such a wonderful job at filtering spam. I've only gotten one or two pieces of spam in my gmail inbox in the last year. I generally receive at least a dozen per day, and I'm just tickled that you make sure all that spam goes into my Spam folder, which generally has over 300 Spam emails in it!



Christopher H.

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I am from India and I miss my Indian friends too much. I became so sad without them because there is no way to talk them without a phone which costs too much for me. But by Gmail I can talk to them for many hours because it is free . I am very happy thanks to Gmail.



Jasleen Kaur, Student
Vernon

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I have all my work emails forwarded to Gmail where a mobile archive of them is kept forever thanks to the storage capacity.



Samer Shennar, IT Manager
Bahrain

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My reason for loving Gmail so much is because my mom is always on the phone, and I never really get a chance to talk with my siblings. And that's when I heard about Gmail. My siblings and I started to use it everyday, and that really makes me feel good.



Shahara Ahmed, Student
New York

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Until Gmail arrived I was never really satisfied with my email experiences and now I have found the most clean cut and innovative web based email system around. I'm still shocked that people use other providers for email because to me Gmail is the only option that is viable when it comes to email.



Benjamin Kerensa, IT Consultant
Crescent City, CA

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I love the new contacts manager! It makes it so easy to add new people to the contacts into their group at the same time. What a time saver for me when I'm adding a bunch of people!



Megan, Secretary of "The Friends"
Vancouver

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Gmail is the best email program I've ever used. It has helped me and my wife not only coordinate our schedules with Google Calendar, but it keeps us in communication with all of our community organizations. Thanks for what you do to make my life easier!



Patrick Furey, Sales
Germantown, MD

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Gmail is so easy and it's ideal for the first timers. The first time I got Gmail I recieved that first message from Gmail It made my comfortable with using Gmail. At the time I didn't know anything about Gmail and now I'm a pro. I feel good having Gmail like everyone else does. I have a ton of recipients even from China. My friends are important to me that's why I have Gmail.



Matt, Computer Geek
St.Ansgar, IA

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Gmail is probably the best email I have ever used. It even works great and fast over dialup and works great with my old PC's that the other services did not! Keep it up! I love Gmail!

Jason, web master
Texas

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I love my Gmail. Why do I love my Gmail? No matter what happens to my computer, all of my saved Gmail is safe! It is always there. No matter where I go I can stay in contact with my friends! And most important, there's no spamming like some other services.



Pat Irish, Hospitality
Columbus, Ohio

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I've used about ten other email applications before Gmail, and never was satisfied with any of them. My sister invited me to Gmail, and ever since then I have been absolutely in love with it. I love how the conversations thread, the ease of archiving mail, the filters and labels, built in chat, spam filters, and the simplicity of replying and forwarding. I love Gmail. I get everybody I can to join. It rocks, and I'm very pleased with it.



Hannah, Pianist/Clerk
Florida

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Well, Gmail has totally changed the way I do my email. Of course saving every darn thread I want to -is revolutionary. My trick is using outgoing drafts as a to-do list utility. I can store as many as I want and they actually reference stuff I need to do. Email extrordinaire & daytimer.



Bob Nagy, Contemplator
Hot Springs, AR

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Simply, I love Gmail because it is the easiest and cleanest way to check email and the fantastic search means that my archived email has become my storage for any kind of info I may want to lookup later, from anywhere. I often email myself info to make it available. Gmail makes checking email a pleasure.



H.J.

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I love Gmail! Why? The page is always clean and orderly. No ads. Any mail is easy to find by searching. Typing the first letter of the address makes the correct address pop up. Always easy to view and open files and pictures. You can search the web right from within the e-mail page. The best of all is that I get NO spam in my inbox!



Marit, Office Manager
Santa Monica, CA

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The story is simple. I used from 3 to 5 email accounts before I got Gmail. I was partially satisfied with almost all of them...Then came you guys. You have litteraly changed the way I see emails. I got Gmail two summers ago and have little less than 4,ooo emails in there and I can still find everything. I could even find a code I quickly wrote down in a hurry on a blank email and it was the only reference I had for it and I found it even when I forgot where it could have been stacked. I am so constantly thrilled...Now I can send emails from Gmail using 3 different email accounts for 3 purposes, send pictures etc. BRAVI!



Riccardo, Student Researcher
Bologna, Italy

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I love the emoticons and how they're animated in Gmail chat! They enhance conversations and make life a bit more fun. Also trying to figure out what's animated and what's not without looking at a list is exciting when you have the mind of a scientist. It's like conducting experiments in order to discover how something works.



Chrissie, Student and Cookie Business Owner
Austin, TX

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When I retired and moved to Colorado in 2006, I established a Gmail account for personal email. (Previously, I used a university email account.) I wanted the flexibility and connectivity of a web-based system, and Gmail had the best basic features and reputation for reliability. I have been very pleased. It has functioned flawlessly for a year and half with almost no problems.



Robert Booker, Retired Military
Fort Collins, Colorado

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Thanks a million, zillion times for Gmail. Email and essentially life, has not been the same after it. The great spam protection, filters, labels, integrated chat and mail search are the features that I really admire and like. Its so easy now, just type in something you're looking for, and soon its in front of you. And whats more, Gmail has been exceptionally helpful for me in sending sweet <3 notes to my sweetie, who stays quite far away from me. Gmail has helped us feel closer and always connected.



Nikhil Tailang, Student
Mumbai, India

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Gmail filters about 1500 spam items for me every day. How excellent is that!



Steve Davis, Loafist
Australia

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Absolutely fantastic email system. It's simply superb. I like the way mails are displayed with continuity. The contact display is useful to understand whether my friend is online or not. Gmail chat is an excellent tool for communicating. Also, I can store documents and photos on the web.



Poovannan, Online Tutor
India

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"G" stands for 'Great' It is so neat
We never delete
From a paperwork hail
Just search Google Mail
No need to get nervous
"G" Mail, at your Service
It's not average e-mail
From 'Greetings' to 'elite'
One click away, enjoy Gmail



Dr Socrates Xenophon della Robbia
Holliston, Massachusetts

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Gmail is a highly anticipated answer to the growing need for a new email standard. It totally revolutionizes the email interface. Gmail did away with the old antiquated folder scheme. In its place are the highly efficient labels. Not only can you classify your emails under one folder, Gmail lets you group your emails in an infinite number of ways. I am never lost in my email conversations anymore. Gmail conveniently groups my email conversations together in a nice, easy to read format. With Gmail, there is no such thing as a lost or deleted email. A fully searchable database of your email coupled with massive amount of storage synthesizes an amazing new standard.



Chase

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I just can't say enough how much I like Gmail! I use it as my primary email address. I love your interface, your advertising is unobtrusive, and the storage lets me concentrate on my email and not on my space remaining. You are changing email forever for the better.



Mifflin D.

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I was deleting some spam recently and noticed how good your spam blocker is. None of my real emails have slipped into the spam folder and I remember only one spam reaching my inbox in the time that I've been using Gmail. Spam is the bane of the internet and it is refreshing to see Gmail put up such a good fight against it. Keep up the good work!



Eric L.

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I am a first-time professor at a four-year university and I use Gmail to correspond with my students. I think that it is so much more user-friendly and powerful than the other email providers that I have used. In particular, I love your huge storage space, conversation-keepers, group-lists, and more. I just feel like I would be much more flustered and lost as a professor if I didn't have your great tools.



Lalita S.

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I didn't really start using email heavily until I came to college. Then I joined some organizations, a lot to be exact. Conveniently, a professor gave me an invite. I've been using Gmail since. I love that Gmail lets me filter all the messages from different organizations and companies. Ones that I don't need to see right away are tagged and archived for me to read later. Seeing 60 new emails in your inbox is intimidating for anyone! Also, I'm on the go a lot. So I fell in love with Gmail again when Google announced a mobile web version and a Java midlet! I can check my mail from my mobile or my PDA!



Alice R.

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I like the way Gmail is constantly evolving - it feels very alive, dynamic, and seems that the Gmail team are very receptive to user ideas. I love features like the email notifier and the instant chat feature. Everything is very unobtrusive and uncluttered. When you log in, there are no links, no ads, and no cluttered news screens. The storage space is amazing as well. I also like the way email conversations are grouped together. I email myself important documents to back them up and I'm no where near the storage limit.



Victoria S.

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I was writing an email to my boss regarding ideas on our team work. In the middle of the letter, my PC crashed. I thought it was gone, but I then restarted the PC, logged in to my account opened the Save Draft feature and found that Gmail automatically saved the letter when my PC crashed. This feature is the best.



Aneris

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I just wanted to thank you for starting Gmail. I was getting tired of all the pornographic, dating, and dieting ads that popped up every time I checked my email. It is refreshing to have an email account where I don't have to be bombarded anymore by flashy ads.



Diane H.

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Google's Gmail has given me what I've been looking for in an email solution. It's clean, fast, easy to navigate; archiving instead of deleting is becoming the way of the world eliminating the frustration of not having vital information down the road. Gmail has provided me with the tools to do my job. In a world where email is essential and access to it is even more vital, Gmail's basic interface is compatible even on mobile phones. Making information available at your fingertips.



Eric S.

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My computer recently died due to hard disk failure and I lost all my pictures and email. Luckily, Gmail had saved all my email, so I was able to find all my saved pictures and email. Also, I was able to import all the email from my Gmail account onto my new computer, while most other servers either delete email or make it difficult to download email that's already been downloaded before. But Gmail allowed me to do it! You don't know how much this means to me!



Anita

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I solemnly decided to only use Gmail since you introduced the application that makes Gmail work on your mobile device. I absolutely love it! It looks great, loads the inbox quickly and you don't loose time trying to "wap" your way into your account.



Ulkrika D.

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I have been using Gmail for just under 1 year now and it has proven to be the fastest, easiest to use service - and not to mention the inbox storage.........wow!! I can keep every message no matter how large it or the attachment is since more storage is added every day! This has helped me keep my computer's CPU usage at an all time low since I do not have to download attachments and save them to my computer, all I have to do is search mail and no matter how old the message is I will find it and guess what? The attachment is always there in that mail at my disposal anywhere anytime! I am so happy that I have switched to Gmail!



Shammi M
Trinidad & Tobago, WI

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I've been using Gmail as my main email account ever since I started receiving an average of 2,500 emails a day (average of two to three per minute), of which 70 percent are telling me that my bank account is expiring and that I need to verify my account information, or that some Nigerian needs my help to assist him in laundering tens of millions of USDs. Then there are lots of personal health products, free software, and more! If not for this wonderful spam filter of Gmail, I'd have to spend 48 hours sitting in front of my mail 24/7 just to keep up!



Nicholas Aaron Khoo, CNET Asia

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Gmail has made it possible to get my mail no matter where I am, and have all my addresses handy, just as though I was using my PC at home.



Jamie
San Francisco

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At this point I am finally able to list my email address on my web site in full public view without worrying about it anymore. I simply don't worry about it...Concerning proper spam filtering, Gmail is the best that exists. I don’t know what Google uses to accomplish this and I honestly don’t care. It just works!



Rich Menga, PC Mechanic

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The only logical choice is Gmail. The real feature that won me over was search. I do not use bookmarks because I use Google instead. The Gmail philosophy is perfect for me.



Zac Garrett, Technology Geek

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I am 21 years old and Gmail is really very helpful for me because I can keep in touch with my friend who lives very far away. We use Gmail to chat and discuss our plans for going on trips. Last week I met an old school friend and we had a good time chatting in Gmail. We all planned a trip and we went to Nandhi Hills, which was amazing. We also planned another trip to go to Sangam, a water place. We are able to discuss all these plans to see each other through Gmail.



Johan Peter
UK

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Google's impact on writers is growing. The dawn of the Internet search engine forever changed the way writers conduct their daily lives...I confess: I have become Googlized. I've been ill for several weeks; before that, out of town for three; and the two months prior spent dealing with a critically ill dog that required daily visits to the vet. My unread messages had burgeoned to a whopping 18,000. It was time. I attacked the keyboard and waged war. I downloaded and downloaded and downloaded. I set up folders, created rules, and redistributed the lot. Emails flew. Junk mail exploded. In 10 hours I dealt with 25,000 emails. I wanted more. I searched the web eager for tools, tips and strategies until I finally stumbled onto Gmail. Wow. Let me sing its song. It's perfect for a writer and why not? Gmail is set up to operate intuitively; writers are intuitive creatures. With the labeling and filtering system, their end-of-time archiving, and email subject conversation flow feature, it's a writer's perfect marriage of technology, inspiration, research, and organization. Imagination is the writer’s only limitation. I opened an account. I now have tools that will make my writing life infinitely more manageable and my writing happily more productive. The mountain of ignored emails simply vanished. Incoming is now a snap.



Vikk Simmons, Blogcritics Magazine

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These are the reasons why I love Gmail more than other webmail services: 1. Gmail is freaking fast. 2. I have many contacts, and having simple contacts management with pictures is superb. Sometimes I don't know the contact by name but when I see their photo, I need nothing else. 3. No banners! I switched mainly because I was getting too many ads, and they distract me badly. I always remove distraction so I can focus. Our human eyes and brain get tired too fast when there are many visual object begging for attention. Thank you for starting something unique and powerful. For creating something that makes my business run much easier & faster.



Max

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With Gmail, I no longer feel the need to use an external email client. I just have my three email addresses forwarded to my Gmail account, which is grand indeed.



Bradley Tammen

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I really enjoy the filters in Gmail, they make email so much easier to manage. There's no way I'd be able to deal with so many thousands of messages if I couldn't label them automatically with filters.



Lee Colleton

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I want to tell you how Gmail is roughly 500 times better than my old university email, which I have since put to forward entirely to my Gmail account. The inbox is so neatly laid out, the search works, sent mail is saved and I can reference it, the 'starring' an email function is convenient, and I love the conversation set up 'stacked as a deck of cards'. Everything about it is great...Gmail is the most impressive email I have ever used, trumping others completely.



Michael Texter

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Gmail saves me sooo much time because I'm doing computer work all day (home-office editing job, very busy) -- and with Gmail Notifier I never have to wonder if emails I'm waiting for have come in. That soft little ding is such a time-saver for a serious working gal. I click on it, get a super-fast answer right back, and barely interrupt my work day. Love it! But come to think of it, I do believe I like the spam filtering even better yet. Thank you for making my work-life incredibly easier and leaving me more time to do fun things.



June Cheatwood

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Gmail's great because I can check my mail via my mobile - and I do!!! ALL the time!! ANY time!!! And I can keep in touch using the Chat facility so easily with friends and family any where in the
world.



Angel Dawson

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I just chatted with a good friend of mine who lives on the other side of the country, and we don't talk much, but it was so nice to be able to chat and catch up. Gmail continues to please me in new ways, and I just want to say thanks for making it what it is.



Spencer Jackson

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I love it because you can sit back and relax while you talk to your friends and family!



Logan

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I love Gmail because it provides me with a way of archiving my children's email without having to delete them any more. My children are young and growing up so fast. They send me many lovely emails that I couldn't save before because of space problems. And now with Gmail I won't ever have to worry about that any more. Thank you for creating such an opportunity for busy mommies like me.



Apvaidyalingan, Gmail mom

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Gmail has helped me connect with my girlfriend a lot easier. Since other mail services add extra ads at the bottom of all outgoing emails, it got very messy when sending emails to her cellphone. The auto draft feature is also a great time saver when your browser freezes or crashes.



Jim Miller

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Gmail with chat is one of the few ways I can keep in touch with my wife and kids since being deployed. Thanks Gmail for keeping a Soldier in touch with his loved ones at home!



Billy Barnes

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I like Gmail because it's a lot faster loading, sending and composing and attaching files than any other email client I've ever used. If I want to attach a file in another mail service, I can still be sitting here waiting on it to attach while I've already attached about 10 with Gmail. It's great! Thanks for being there!!!!



April

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I just signed up for Gmail and WOW. You save me so much time. I just imported my contact list and I did not need to contact my I.T. department. You have made it so easy!!



Paul Marshall

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Thank you for whatever upgrades you've added to the spam filtering lately. I just realized that it's been months since anything even touched my spam folder.



Jordan

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Gmail helped me stay connected 24 hours to my only son, who's away from home for the first time. Using Gmail also helps me learn more about computer skills. I can even ask my non-computer user friends and family members to join.



Shanti Jain

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Gmail is trouble free, easy to use and organizes automatically. Just wait a few days and you'll come up with something new to add. It's just great!!!!



Manny Silverman

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As a medical student, someone who runs a school club, technology enthusiast, researcher, and not to mention 23 year old, I spend at least an hour per day in Gmail reading, forwarding, and replying to countless important emails. I know if I had to keep using another web based email service, I'd be spending several more hours per week given the features in Gmail that I have come to rely on. Gmail is one of the few services I would be willing to pay a lot to access, yet don't have to.



Craig Napolitano

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I absolutely love Gmail. I really like the fact that it tiles all related emails allowing you to expand all prior emails and review them in one view. I also really, really like the fact that it records how many days ago the email was sent. This is very helpful to me in my business, as deadlines are critical.



Crystal L. Stokes

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