OT: which to use - email client or web-based email?

[Chris Mohler]

On Tue, Jun 10, 2008 at 4:38 PM, Young <tuxman at knology.net> wrote:
> David Fox wrote:
>> On Tue, Jun 10, 2008 at 1:55 PM, Default User <xyzzyx at sbcglobal.net> wrote:
>>
>>> considered the possibility of using a web-based email service (Hotmail,
>>> Yahoo, Gmail, etc.), either in addition to or instead of a traditional
>>> email client.
>>
>> I've used gmail for about a year. Offhand, I much prefer doing my own
>> mail with a mail.client, but gmail isn't that bad.
>>
>> Stay clear of yahoo and hotmail. Those services are there mostly to
>> say "here spammers I have an email box".
>>
> How are the ads on Gmail? Do you notice them tracking the topics in your
> email?
>
> If someone writes to you about your medical problems, do you start to
> see adds for related products?

Yes - the ads are targeted to the content of your mail.  Sometimes
with quite interesting results :)

I'm sure this spooks some people, but I look at it like this: your
mail server *has* to read your mail, or else it would never get
delivered.  If during the reading it does a keyword search for ads, no
biggie.

Chris