Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

I remember back around the time of IBM 86486 machines, when we still were working with DOS. Back then, there were articles once a year about how we were going toward diskless terminals. We`d have a monitor, and the "necessary" floppy drive for booting up, but we`d immediately go out into a network for everything else.

These terminals never happened. Then came better computers, Windows, and the Mac started taking some strong market share. Unix, Linux, and all sorts of new things started happening. Along came the Internet, then came the World Wide Web, and every year or so, we`d be talking about online applications.

Even today, everyone is jumping up and down about how exciting it`ll be when we no longer need a desktop or home computer. We`ll log into the web, and get everything we could possibly ever need, all online, and the world will end in an explosive orgasm of networked Nirvana. Right?

At work, we had a helluva time coming up with a way to send emails to prospective customers (real estate agents). We wanted to embed HTML formatting, along with a few images, and for a variety of reasons it couldn`t be done at this particular location.

The solution was to open a Gmail account, then pick up everything locally through Outlook Express. Did this, pushed that, changed something, and WahLah!....it worked.

Until today.

Now it seems that Google has decided to "help" us by fighting spam. I first noticed this two days ago, when I sent myself an email from work to remind myself about a Web address. It wasn`t delivered, and I was told that the message "looked like spam."

The Google Earth truck drove by and sprayed the building with automatic machine-gun fire, blew out the windows, and over a loud-speaker, said, "You`ve been warned!" Okay...so that didn`t actually happen...

When I got home, I put myself on a white-list in my home email, then re-sent the original....it went through.

Today, I tried to send about 10 emails, individually, to prospective agents, and none of them went through. My "daily quota" had apparently been exceeded, regardless that people used to believe that was around 500 messages.

Nowhere was there much info, but there were quite a few posts about people scratching their heads as to what happened. Y`know what happened? Google decided to take control of it`s free product, and tell me how I can send mail, what sort of mail, and whether or not it approved of my mail.

Throughout history humanity has battled between centralized control versus individual freedoms. We have democratic republics versus totalitarian dictatorships, but we also have peer-to-peer networks versus client-server and network administrators.

We learn about free products where we can host a Web site or do backups, but there`s fine print. There`s ALWAYS fine print: At any time, the company reserves the right to charge money, and if you don`t pay, they`ll wipe out your data or Web site.

Microsoft continually believes that all of us would love to store all our information somewhere else; preferably on a Microsoft-controlled network. Then they don`t understand why more people aren`t doing this. So they continually "improve" Windows in such a way as to make it more and more the de facto standard to place your data somewhere where you don`t control it.

Google docs, applications, email, calendars, and so forth, all are wonderful things, right? Everyone says so, and can`t understand why some people don`t get with the program and do everything collaboratively. I wouldn`t be surprised if we don`t see laws passed to force those of us who`d rather have a home machine to use online everything.

So waddya think? It`s certainly Google`s right to change the way they offer their free email system. I can`t argue with that. I guess I thought, though, that they actually cared to have a working system. I do know that I`ll always have my critical applications and all my own data.....in my own possession. I might temporarily store some stuff elsewhere, but only a copy, and only temporarily.

Now that we can`t email 20-40 people a day from work with information about the homes they`ve viewed, we`ve gone to a more difficult system. That`s fine, it`ll mean more wasted time, harder work, and other such nonsense. BUT!...at least our customers will actually hear from us.

Anyone else having second thoughts about "global village," and "one big happy family?"

Not only do I think we`ll be doing everything digitally online, but I think we`ll all be doing it from phones and small mobile devices.  Desktop and laptop computers will disappear altogether as we`ll be able to do anything on the go.

LOL! I know...I felt the same way until the Google Earth truck came by with cannons and broadswords! :-D