Comments on: Yahoo! Mail trashing Gmail invites

Yahoo! Mail trashing Gmail invites

tranquileye — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 12:54:48 -0800

Yahoo! Mail is trashing Gmail invites. Regular Gmail appears in the inbox, but invites are sorted to the spam folder.

By: chickygrrl

chickygrrl — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 12:58:47 -0800

And from what I experienced last night sending an invite, Hotmail users won't receive them at all.

By: chickygrrl

chickygrrl — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 13:01:36 -0800

Note to self: read article before commenting next time.

By: y0bhgu0d

y0bhgu0d — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 13:01:39 -0800

ingenious. i suppose a way to get around it would be to send the invite to yourself, and then give the person the URL to create the account.

By: smackfu

smackfu — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 13:02:26 -0800

Who would think that tons of messages that all look the same and sent to many different addresses would be classified as spam?

By: jacobsee

jacobsee — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 13:05:37 -0800

just tried the cut-n-paste trick noted in the article and it was received by my yahoo account just fine and dandy.

By: andycoan

andycoan — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 13:06:49 -0800

Ah, but smackfu, you're forgetting that the recipient didn't ask to receive the invite--that's clearly not SPAM... O. Right....

By: badstone

badstone — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 13:07:30 -0800

Who would think that tons of messages that all look the same and sent to many different addresses would be classified as spam? And that has what to do with Gmail invites?

By: konolia

konolia — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 13:15:24 -0800

I had no trouble getting my gmail invite, and my regular address is Hotmail.

By: hughbot

hughbot — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 13:16:09 -0800

And from what I experienced last night sending an invite, Hotmail users won't receive them at all. I got mine via Hotmail. Maybe this is a recent thing? On Preview: What Konolia said.

By: jpoulos

jpoulos — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 13:21:58 -0800

I sent my sister an invite to her yahoo account on 6/15. She never got it. I cut and pasted it two days later, when I realized she never got it, and she got the second one just fine.

By: mathowie

mathowie — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 13:22:57 -0800

I sent some to both hotmail and yahoo accounts and they seem to be working. If yahoo and hotmail were in fact blocking them, then that crazy california senator that introduced the bill to ban gmail should rewrite it to ban yahoo and hotmail as well, since this type of event like blocking gmail invites would require filtering a message for content, then performing actions on it without a user's knowledge.

By: crazy finger

crazy finger — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 13:24:08 -0800

I just tried this moments ago with a hotmail account - no problems.

By: tranquileye

tranquileye — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 13:27:20 -0800

Just before I posted, I tried sending invites to both Hotmail and Yahoo! Mail accounts. To Hotmail, no problem. At Yahoo! the invite was moved to the Bulk folder. Your mileage may vary.

By: reklaw

reklaw — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 13:28:43 -0800

You can always just send someone the url, whether it's by email or messenger or whatever -- email the invite to yourself with some generic name, and then just give them the link. On that note: gmail invite!

By: bashos_frog

bashos_frog — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 13:29:32 -0800

Yahoo stuck my invite into the spam folder. WHen I changed the three instances of the word "google" to "test" the message went into my normal folder. This indicates to me that this message is not being filtered by a baysian filter. Other mail with the word google gets through just fine. Looks like they are targeting these invites specifically, not via baysian filters, or other spam rules.

By: bashos_frog

bashos_frog — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 13:35:56 -0800

matt: It you pull your yahoo mail down with your normal pop3 mail client (as I do, with Evolution), you might not notice anything as yahoo sends the bulk mail along with the normal mail. But if you are using the web interface, you might not think to check the bulk folder to find your message. This may be what they are counting on. And from the limited testing I've done - they are definitely filtering on content - not keywords, or originating address, or subject.

By: eas98

eas98 — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 13:39:10 -0800

Hey, who is cwaltrip?? Bastard!! :)

By: eyebeam

eyebeam — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 13:45:19 -0800

That would be me. Thanks, reklaw! :-)

By: mr_crash_davis

mr_crash_davis — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 13:47:20 -0800

Could we agree that "invite" is a verb, and "invitation" is a noun? Thank you.

By: ed

ed — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 13:47:25 -0800

Yup, crazy Californian senators who actually care about upholding the first paragraph of the California Constitution. Who would have thought?

By: konolia

konolia — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 14:26:22 -0800

Well, I might have gotten my invite and signed up, but now for over a day I have been unable to get into my Konolia site-I keep getting this server problem page that tells me to try back in 30 seconds. So much for flushing my hotmail account.

By: Zurishaddai

Zurishaddai — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 14:41:28 -0800

I can confirm that this happened in my case—a gmail invite to my Yahoo mail (thanks maurice!) was routed to bulk mail, whence it disappeared soon after I read it. Fortunately, I don't get much spam at my yahoo address, and I was eagerly awaiting the invite, so I didn't miss it. (I naively thought that this was just Yahoo's filter being screwy/defective.)

By: john

john — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 14:43:43 -0800

Should I feel bad that I have not been invited? Maybe someday I can finally ditch hotmail.

By: jeblis

jeblis — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 14:50:23 -0800

Should I feel bad that I have not been invited? Don't feel bad if you haven't been invited. I believe most of the new invites are given to current gmail users to send to friends. Ask someone with an account to give you an invite. TotalFarkers have even set up a website so they can easily donate and get gmail invites. (you must be a TotalFarker though...)

By: tomorama

tomorama — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 14:52:50 -0800

I can hook you up.

By: reklaw

reklaw — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 14:54:48 -0800

jeblis: Mefi has done more-or-less the same thing. Tons of invites there.

By: reklaw

reklaw — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 14:57:31 -0800

Oh, and mr_crash_davis: if you go look up invite in a dictionary, it'll probably say something like "informal noun: an invitation". I think this battle was lost quite a while ago (have you never had a 'party invite', 'wedding invite', etc.?)

By: john

john — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 15:20:44 -0800

That would be neato.

By: tomorama

tomorama — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 15:23:20 -0800

email me

By: elwoodwiles

elwoodwiles — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 15:24:21 -0800

invite here! tell me if that worked, I'm trying to post the url that leads to the invite.

By: elwoodwiles

elwoodwiles — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 15:28:26 -0800

Ack! I just realized why doing that is not such a brilliant idea. I wish to give the invite to a mefite, but anyone can pick up that invite. Oh, well, I have one left to anyone who emails me. I'm living without a home connection these days, but I check my email daily, so don't fret if I don't respond quickly.

By: Tryptophan-5ht

Tryptophan-5ht — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 15:32:16 -0800

first come first served..... on your mefi honor - please just take one. http://gmail.google.com/gmail/a-99abdecc0a-18bfc37173 http://gmail.google.com/gmail/a-99abdecc0a-caf5413110 http://gmail.google.com/gmail/a-99abdecc0a-5c7c4af388 http://gmail.google.com/gmail/a-99abdecc0a-126e63d6f8

By: mr_crash_davis

mr_crash_davis — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 15:34:04 -0800

"...have you never had a 'party invite', 'wedding invite', etc.?" No, because I have no friends. Thanks for reminding me.

By: Tryptophan-5ht

Tryptophan-5ht — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 15:34:29 -0800

http://gmail.google.com/gmail/a-8d3c3392d-acf24059f2 http://gmail.google.com/gmail/a-8d3c3392d-196e712ca8

By: elwoodwiles

elwoodwiles — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 15:39:11 -0800

I'm out of invites.

By: bob sarabia

bob sarabia — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 15:39:55 -0800

blast! all used up. oh wait, i already have one. i just get excited easily.

By: h00dini

h00dini — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 15:43:57 -0800

Tryptophan-5ht, thanks much for the link.

By: Tryptophan-5ht

Tryptophan-5ht — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 15:45:34 -0800

By: rhyax

rhyax — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 15:56:17 -0800

ehh, my mac Mail junk filter thought it was spam too, and it's been trained on real spam. i say the invites are just spammy.

By: Blue Stone

Blue Stone — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 17:47:08 -0800

I sent a gmail invite to a yahoo account. Got through no problem, straight to the inbox. It was yahoo.co.uk, though. I still have a few, if there's anyone who still wants 'em.

By: soulhuntre

soulhuntre — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 17:49:33 -0800

/. went apesh*t for a while a few days ago with conspiracy theories about hotmail and gmail. Turns out that this sort of thing is a natural consequence of spam filters that have to make decisions. The days are gone when you coudl send someone an email and expect that it will actually make it to their inbox. Between bad spam filters, overly paranois sysadmins and out of control and over zealous blacklisting organizations email is no longer reliable.

By: Blue Stone

Blue Stone — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 19:10:13 -0800

I'm all out of invites now.

By: MrLint

MrLint — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 19:26:09 -0800

"WebmasterWorld member Robert Skelton reported his ISP is blocking Gmail emails "due to potential privacy and confidentiallity considerations." " This is a very interesting position to take since email goes over the internet in plaintext. So really the ISP should be blocking all email incoming and outgoing.

By: Decypher

Decypher — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 21:56:08 -0800

What other avenues does one have to get an invite these days? Other than begging or ebay? I feel like I'm out of the loop without one.

By: thatwhichfalls

thatwhichfalls — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 22:32:26 -0800

Decypher, check your email (including the spam folder)>

By: mosch

mosch — Tue, 22 Jun 2004 23:29:36 -0800

Thanks to those of you who posted invites. And damn you to hell, all of you who used up 100% of the invites before I got to them.

By: salmacis

salmacis — Wed, 23 Jun 2004 02:40:20 -0800

Will someone explain to me why I'd want a gmail account? There's nothing wrong with my ISP's mail servers.

By: vacapinta

vacapinta — Wed, 23 Jun 2004 03:02:21 -0800

http://gmail.google.com/gmail/a-164650bdad-d120587082 http://gmail.google.com/gmail/a-164650bdad-db8680e4a3 Two from me. first come, first serve.

By: Decypher

Decypher — Wed, 23 Jun 2004 04:08:06 -0800

Thank you thatwhichfalls. Much appreciation. FYI - The invite landed in my bulk folder. (I had spamguard on)

By: u.n. owen

u.n. owen — Wed, 23 Jun 2004 10:37:44 -0800

Um, much easier way - plus it gets sent to the right person, so you can see whether or not it's being filtered: Send the invite to the person you wish to give the account to. If they do not receive it, check your sent-mail folder - GMail saves invites as sent mail. You can cut and paste the URL from there, and it saves you that step if it does go through. :)

By: faceonmars

faceonmars — Thu, 24 Jun 2004 08:51:34 -0800

Salmacis, I can't tell you why everybody else wants one, but I want one because all the cool kids have one. If I had a Gmail address, I could be cool too. I have a 100 meg Yahoo address (g17p70@yahoo.com) and a little five meg address (faceonmars@omnicast.net) that I've never filled up, but I won't be really cool until I can send mail to all my friends from my Gmail account. If somebody sent me an invite, I'd be really grateful. And cool.

By: thatwhichfalls

thatwhichfalls — Thu, 24 Jun 2004 08:57:00 -0800

faceonmars, check your email (that's my last invite btw).

By: faceonmars

faceonmars — Fri, 25 Jun 2004 09:22:01 -0800

Yahoo! I've got Gmail! Thanks, thatwhichfalls!