The interface is split up into two columns: inbound and unbound. The inbound column displays a syndicated feed of all email accounts, Facebook messages, wall posts, Twitter direct messages, and @mentions. You can also single out an email account and filter it by unread or starred messages. Emails can be deleted, starred, or even archived (for Gmail). Any changes made through Threadsy is reflected on the respective email service. For composing mail, Threadsy offers a rich text editor, the ability to send mail from any email account, and include attachments. When choosing a recipient, Threadsy auto-fills contacts from email accounts and even cross checks Facebook for profile pictures. Unfortunately Threadsy is unable to send Facebook messages from within the user interface at the moment, but will still redirect you to Facebook to compose the message. Overall, I was quite impressed by the organization and functionality of the email aggregation.

The second column, unbound, manages social networks. Threadsy only supports the two popular social networks at the moment: Facebook and Twitter. There is one feed that combines both Facebook status updates and tweets, but also has the option of filtering down to only one service. There’s support for multiple Twitter accounts as well. Threadsy allows updating both Facebook and Twitter statuses at once. From within the Threadsy interface you can view/leave comments and ‘like’ Facebook statuses. For Twitter you can retweet, reply, and favorite tweets. Clicking on a contact will display a combined profile page that displays a feed of both Facebook and Twitter updates.

In addition to the in and out bound columns, there is a chat bar at the bottom which uses Meebo. The bar stays out of the way of all other communication, but is convenient enough to access chat accounts at any time. It also supports using a universal status and customizing online/offline per account.

Keeping in mind that this service is still in beta, it still has some bugs. The team at Threadsy has done an incredible job of putting so many services into one functional page. It’s rare to see something useful fall into our radar with so many pointless start ups in the making. In the move towards cloud computing, Threadsy could very well be the future desktop email client. While I was skeptical to try this service at first, I have now begun to use Threadsy to manage all my online communication. While I do still experience occasional hiccups, those will hopefully be resolved with further development. This service has real potential and I look forward to see where the company will take it.

Threadsy is still in private beta, but I’ve got some invites to give away. (You’re welcome!) The first 10 people to click through this link will be able to sign up right away! Enjoy: http://bit.ly/4S4Etx

Links: Threadsy.com

Google has constantly been adding new features to Gmail since it originally launched in 2004. Over the last two years they have added over 2GB of storage space, RSS feed reader, virus scanning, chat, and many more features. Their latest add-on allows Gmail users to associate images with each contact (email address), therefore making it easier than ever to identify contacts. Although this may be a “new feature” for Gmail, other email services such as Yahoo! Mail have already been working on implementing custom “avatars,” which are used in Yahoo! Messenger, into their mail services for a long time.

This feature, as usual, is currently only available to a few users; however Google will eventually enable this feature for every account. Once this feature is enabled, the next time you get an email from your friend you may see an image your friend has selected or one that you may have set for him. Check back here for more information, but in the meantime login to your Gmail account and check if you already have this feature.

Links: Gmail | Gmail “Whats New!”
Related: Google Integration | Gmail Anti-Virus

After the recent release of Google Calendar, Google has decided to make navigating through their most popular products easier. Google has placed a small toolbar at the top left of Google, Gmail, Google Calendar, and a few other pages. Therefore, if you do wish to navigate between Google Calendar and Gmail for example, you no longer have to go through the hassle of opening a new window/tab and typing in a URL. This new feature is very handy and useful tools that will help people using Google’s products navigate to where they want to go faster. Not all Google Accounts have the feature added to them yet, but expect to see this feature on you Gmail or Google Calendar page within a few weeks.

Links: Google Calendar | Gmail
Related: MSN Calendar | Yahoo Calendar

On Wednesday (04/13/06) Google unveiled their latest product, Google Calendar. The new web-based application is open to the public, but is expected to remain in beta temporarily. Google Calendar, code-name CL2, helps track events, schedule appointments, and share them with others. This new service is completely intergraded with Gmail, allowing users to add events mentioned in messages to their calendar or emailing scheduled events to contacts. Google Calendar will also notify the user by email and/or SMS notifications if requested. Since Google Calendar supports iCal standards, it can import content from applications such as MS Outlook.

Main Features:

• Gmail Intergration – send events to contacts or save mentioned events
• Calendar Sharing – create public calendars or grant users permission
• Data Importing – import data from other applications (Outlook, etc.)
• Multi-Calendars – manage seperate calendars for work, home, etc.

Any calendar can be easily shared among others by either giving specific users access or by making it open to the public. The application will even schedule appointments with others not using Google Calendar through email. This new service is amazingly better and faster than both MSN’s and Yahoo’s services, which have existed for many years. Google Calendar will work in both Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox, but not in Safari. I suggest trying or at least testing this new service, as it is completely free.

Links: Google Calendar | Press Release
Related: MSN Calendar | Yahoo Calendar
Coverage: BetaNews | Weblogs Inc | TechCrunch

Today, (01/12/06) Google released personalized homepages for mobile phones. It is just like google.com/ig for desktop computers, except it works for mobile phones. To get access to it just go to google.com/xhtml and it should work on most WAP enabled mobile phones. Once you get there press on “Personalized Home” and it will take you to your custom homepage. Just like the PC edition this will display all the items you have already set on your computer on your phone. It will display gmail, news, weather, stock quotes, movie times, and RSS feeds. This works great on the PSP since the standard custom homepages don’t function properly on it. The only problem with this is the fact that you can only set what content you would like to see on your computer, therefore it is currently not possible to add or remove content on the go.

Link: Google Mobile Info | Google Mobile | FAQs
Related: The Google Pack | NeWs Up^2-DaTe (30)

Google seems to be working an anti-virus scanning program that will run behind the scenes for their Gmail email service. According to the FAQs page just like Yahoo and Hotmail, the new virus scan will check all incoming and outgoing messages for viruses. If a message with a virus is received it will be fixed if possible or deleted. If you try to send a message with a virus, Gmail won’t let the user send the message until the attachment has been removed. Gmail has currently been fairly safe due to the fact that they don’t allow attaching the “.exe” file formats in which most viruses travel through. Google already has good spam fighting services, but with this addition Gmail will become safer than ever.Google has not yet announced any information about this yet, but if Google does add a Virus Scan to Gmail it will definatly be a great addition to the service.

From the Gmail Help Center:

How does anti-virus scanning work?
Each time you send and receive attachments, Gmail automatically scans them for viruses.
If a virus is found in an attachment you’ve received, our system will attempt to remove it, or clean the file, so you can still access the information it contains. If the virus can’t be removed from the file, you won’t be able to download it.
If a virus is found in an attachment you’re trying to send, you won’t be able to send the message until you remove the attachment.

Link: Gmail Help Center
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