What Ever Happened to Hotmail?

[Avro Arrow]

56K?! You were lucky! When I were a kid, we 'ad nowt but a damp pair of grandad's old shoelaces for a connection and a 110 baud modem made from a discarded old egg carton.

LOL. When I started out, 300 baud was still a thing. I was "fortunate" that my dad bought a 1200bps modem. Then we got a 2400bps external. I actually used that 2400bps modem to run my own BBS.

 

[Raunchy]

"At the time, there was no provider hotter than the aptly-named Hotmail"

That is BS. Nobody ascribed any particular panache to Hotmail. It was simply the best-known free E-mail provider. Then, as now, if you wanted any kind of credibility you had your own domain.

Anyone (or worse, any business) who thinks a third-party domain on his E-mail address isn't amateur-hour... is an amateur.

 

[elementalSG]

LOL. When I started out, 300 baud was still a thing. I was "fortunate" that my dad bought a 1200bps modem. Then we got a 2400bps external. I actually used that 2400bps modem to run my own BBS.

My first computer also had 1200 baud since it was an IBM XT. Good times when text BBSs were all the rage!

 

[Avro Arrow]

My first computer also had 1200 baud since it was an IBM XT. Good times when text BBSs were all the rage!

Oh yeah! I even had a FidoNet address! It was cool to see all of the international echomail from around the world. Echomail was the precursor to the online forums we have (like what we're doing now) and Matrix Mail was used to send private messages to people around the world. It was the precursor to the modern email, although it wasn't nearly as private as the SysOps of all boards that it passed through could read it.

SEAdog, BinkleyTerm, D'Bridge and FrontDoor were the major mail handlers in this part of the world and I assume most other places as well.

 

[Gezzer]

I remember attending a resume workshop recently wherein the presenter said if you use "hotmail" on your resume then the employer will probably toss your resume in the garbage...who the hell wants to hire someone with an email from the 1990s?! Made sense... the tech aware use Gmail.

Actually I would prefer not to work any place that puts that much emphasis on something so trivial. Truth is I still use my hotmail address. But I also use my ISP supplied one as well. Anything that requires an address and could potentially increase my spam of phishing emails I use hotmail. Also anything to do with gaming, hobbies, etc.
I reserve my ISP supplied one for anything where I want to give a more professional impression. Or for any 2FA needs. IMHO Gmail doesn't give any more of a favorable impression than hotmail or yahoo does. Web based most useful trait is the fact you can throw away your address if you have to.

 

[Hotlynx16]

I remember attending a resume workshop recently wherein the presenter said if you use "hotmail" on your resume then the employer will probably toss your resume in the garbage...who the hell wants to hire someone with an email from the 1990s?! Made sense... the tech aware use Gmail.

I use Gmail as my junk email account!Ha,Ha!

 

[lazer]

I still have my Hotmail account, as well as my Yahoo and AOL account, but mostly like gmail.....

 

[EdmondRC]

I still remember back in computer class in highschool telling a fellow student how to search for hotmail (he wasn't the brightest). I told him just put "hot male" in the search bar. The teacher came over and saw his web results... hahaha...

 

[Khanonate]

I still use Hotmail and Gmail is mostly for junk.

 

[Quinnbeast]

"widely used, but are now gone."

Has hotmail actually gone anywhere? Or just been rebranded to Outlook? I've used my account pretty much every day since 1998, doesn't seem to have gone anywhere.

 

[Avro Arrow]

Anyone (or worse, any business) who thinks a third-party domain on his E-mail address isn't amateur-hour... is an amateur.

Unless it's done on purpose, like with me.

 

[CybaGirl]

I still use my hotmail... its my windows / xbox account now

Yes me too LOL

 

[joe1946]

I started with @msn.com when I started beta testing MSN in the Spring of 1995 then Microsoft changed it to @hotmail.com . I also have gmail.

 

[CybaGirl]

My first computer also had 1200 baud since it was an IBM XT. Good times when text BBSs were all the rage!

I use to run a BBS on my Amiga 2000 that I still have after all these years. I ran AMI Express on a US Robotics HST 14.4k modem, LOL. I had the modem for years, too. But somewhere along the lines it was lost in all the moves I have done. Still have the Quantum Fireball hard drive with the BBS on it still. Which I think total 52MB if my memory serves me right?

Best years of my life and so many fun times. Especially when I use to get international callers.

 

[m4a4]

Still have my hotmail as my primary. I was a smart enough kid to make it future proof (and not have some-dumb-name-##@hotmail.com) lol