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Google Apps stops accepting free sign-ups

googleenterprise.blogspot.com

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Re: Google Apps stops accepting free sign-ups

#211

Post by 18pfsmt »

benaiah wrote: post #144

Outlook.com's equivalent offering, https://domains.live.com , is free (Hotmail also offered it, but they've changed the branding). I've been running my email on there for the better part of a decade. To those who point at Office 365, that's similar but different, and it costs money. If you want a guide, this one seems pretty good: http://www.omegaweb.com/2012/09/how-to-configure-a-custom-do... Between the mistaken de…

When I last looked, IMAP was not available on the free custom domains. Is that still the case?

Re: Google Apps stops accepting free sign-ups

#212

Post by tszming »

This might be painful at the beginning but it could be a win-win situation in long term for most parties:

1. Google: can focus on customer service, 2. Google's share holders: more revenue, 3. Competitors: more competitive advantages, 4. Startups: time to disrupt, 5. Users: Email should be decentralized, why rely on a single provider is a good thing?

Re: Google Apps stops accepting free sign-ups

#213

Post by squidsoup »

indiecore wrote: post #66
alanctgardner2 wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a pretty pessimistic view. Customers are self-interested too: they want free content and services, but they also want absolute privacy, to ad-block everything, and generally cut off any possible revenue stream. This seems like it leads to a sort of local maxima where you produce the minimum quality required to drive users, with as little cost as possible. By cutting off ad-supported free users, Google is atte…

by cutting off free users they just opened themselves to getting undercut by a smaller company that can offer fewer, cheaper, targeted options. I just wanted an email for my domain and that's not worth 50 bucks a year. I'll just set up my own email system at this point, call it a learning experience and never be exposed to the rest of whatever was in Google Apps.

If Heroku can afford to support free users on it's PaaS, it surprises me that it isn't feasible for a giant like Google. I can't see this move doing anything to improve what is arguably an already unpopular service.

Re: Google Apps stops accepting free sign-ups

#215

Post by wyck »

dangrossman wrote: post #79
toomuchtodo wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just helped several companies move to Google Apps from Rackspace over the weekend; their web interface is horrible and Google provides a much better experience on mobile (both iOS and Android) than Rackspace ever could.

That only matters if you care about the web interface. Lots of businesses don't, they're all on Outlook. I use Thunderbird (IMAP); I've literally never logged into Rackspace's webmail client.

The 2$ plan does not sync with anything. The 3$ plan only sync's mobile with webmail (big woop). For "real" business email you need rackspace exchange which is 10$ a month per user, this adds up very quickly with a lot of users.

Re: Google Apps stops accepting free sign-ups

#216

Post by foxylad »

I have no problem paying for a Google Apps account where I actually use Google apps, but at the moment you have to have a Google Apps account to link a domain to an Appengine app. Some of our apps have two or three domains showing the same app, and because you need to have an account for each email address that Appengine sends email from, we have three or four accounts (support, noreply, accounts per domain.

So this move is going to add $600 per year to our costs - all for virtual accounts that don't actually use Google Apps at all.

Hopefully this was unintended, and Google will continue to provide free accounts for domains linked to Appengine apps - or provide another mechanism for linking and authorising sending addresses.

Re: Google Apps stops accepting free sign-ups

#217

Post by RaSoJo »

benaiah wrote: post #144

Outlook.com's equivalent offering, https://domains.live.com , is free (Hotmail also offered it, but they've changed the branding). I've been running my email on there for the better part of a decade. To those who point at Office 365, that's similar but different, and it costs money. If you want a guide, this one seems pretty good: http://www.omegaweb.com/2012/09/how-to-configure-a-custom-do... Between the mistaken de…

Thanks for sharing. This ought to come in handy.

I for one had no clue about such an offering.

Re: Google Apps stops accepting free sign-ups

#218

Post by g-garron »

niketdesai wrote: post #195
shuzchen wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's $50/year for each user. Easy to stomach if it's only yourself, but add even a partner (not to mention a small team with a bootstrapped product) and it starts to make less sense financially.

Sorry, but even for a team of 6 people if you can't muster $300/yr (breaking down to $25/mo or $4/user-mo) you aren't bootstrapping. You're being inefficient, and perhaps even reckless with your endeavor. (Unless you're building a competitor). Sometimes it's about the pennies. But other times, especially early, it won't be these types chunks of money that kill you. I used to go on CL and do user-studies for $50 a pop…

Better pay those $300 and have your people and you 100% focus on your product, creating it, marketing it and selling it. Than dealing with spam rules or downtime servers.

That is why heroku exists right? Otherwise only linode or ec2 could make business. Now if you have free time (you shouldn't) then, it is a whole different story. I agree with you.

Re: Google Apps stops accepting free sign-ups

#219

Post by spqr »

rhizome wrote: post #201
indiecore wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

by cutting off free users they just opened themselves to getting undercut by a smaller company that can offer fewer, cheaper, targeted options. I just wanted an email for my domain and that's not worth 50 bucks a year. I'll just set up my own email system at this point, call it a learning experience and never be exposed to the rest of whatever was in Google Apps.

$50/yr is less than $5/mo, what is the convenience of email hosting worth to you?

I pay $4 per month for Exchange Online. I paid that even when Google Apps was free because it is vastly superior. When MS finally got their act together I couldn't wait to move my MX records off of Google's inferior service. Now that it's more expensive than the superior service, good luck Google.

Re: Google Apps stops accepting free sign-ups

#220

Post by g-garron »

indiecore wrote: post #107
alanctgardner2 wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For most people, the time and effort of setting up and maintaining an email server is probably worth more than $5 per user per month. For a company of 100 people, that's about 10 person hours every month, without considering the initial cost to buy the hardware. Not to mention the risk of something going horribly wrong and blacking out your email, unless you've co-located the mail server on enterprise grade hardware…

Yes and if I was setting up a company of 100 people I'd be fine with that because I probably have the cash flow to support that. I was in the middle of setting up a service for a company of one at the moment and having one or two redirected emails isn't worth fifty dollars a year each right now.

I have the premium account for 8 people. If we were 100, I may setup an in house exchange or similar. I may have 3 more guys maintaining the email, web and the rest of Internet related hard/soft.

For 8 I prefer $50 per year. Three more guys over 8 is ridiculous.

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