Hotmail Getting a Facelift

So here's what happened. On a normal day I usually come home to a nice warm cup of something and just get to relax. Today was no different. However, usually when I switch on the computer and then navigate to the Hotmail website, I expect to simply check my mail and then for my day to move on. But today that did not happen, Hotmail refused to let me in! I needed to know what was going on, I needed a quick fix!

So I trailed the web to see if Hotmail was undergoing any upgrades, and to my sheer shock, they have been considering it for sometime, in order to stay ahead in the competitive rat race of free webmail services. They are going to call their new webmail service simply, Mail. Wow! What a big change! (sarcasm is rife). The few BETA testers who have been allowed to use this service have posted some screenshots of it as can be seen to the left. I have to say in my honest opinion that I have never seen such a bland, ugly, dated, wrongly laid website in my life! Mail is the representation of everything that is wrong in this Earth.

However, even after finding out about Mail there were no certainties that this was in fact the case as to why the Hotmail server was down. It may have been my firewall going crazy, it could have been scheduled repairs on their server (in which case, where is the schedule?) or it may have been that NTL (my Broadband provider) were paid by Gmail to block all access to the Hotmail website for a day so to keep their competitive edge. As one person (who amounts to 1 in the entire of the World's population) I simply was not in the loop as to what was going on. Neither was anyone else.

However, using Occam's Razor, the simplest solution would probably be the right one. The simplest and most logical solution to the Hotmail server being down was that Hotmail was down because it had decided, on the one day when I really needed to access my email, to upgrade their system. Unfortunately, I cannot be sure because, as is the usual Microsoft way of failing to inform its customer base, they have not posted any sort of message as to why their server is down. As a customer this portrays a bad image of Microsoft as an unreliable, untrustworthy brand. Especially when Microsoft's new Operating System, Windows Vista, is just on the verge on being released and Microsoft need at this crucial point in time all the credulity they can get.

I am now strongly considering burning all the Microsoft products I have and replacing them with Open Source free and efficient alternatives like Open Office. Maybe I will just file a claim to the courts that the downtime of Hotmail gave me huge losses in my non existent business. I'll have to see. Until then, enjoy life people of the world!