The Outlook from here

There was a decent article in Wired about this last week, here.

Personally, I can't imagine not using my desktop client (thunderbird). It has a million features you couldn't get online. Heck, beyond features, it's extendable, which you can't really get online.

And it makes having multiple email accounts a breeze.

That's not even to mention everything Scott said in the Wired article.

Good points (and reasons).

Web-based mail is a compelling choice for me because of a combination of:

1) The ability to get my mail anywhere.

2) The fact that the feature set has reached the point where for me it passes the "good enough" test.

I'm still locked into a desktop client at work, but for my other needs Gmail works well enough. I could use Yahoo mail full time as well (and do for certain things). I haven't tried the new Microsoft offering.

Well, it's certainly true, too, that having a desktop client doesn't preclude using webmail when you're away from your computer.

But it's kind of a "to each his own" thing. There is great appeal to both options. I expect that desktop clients will be used mostly by power users in the next few years, because most people don't understand extendability and don't have multiple accounts.

eh.