This is how I understand it: “MSN Hotmail” was, a year or so ago, updated and renamed “Windows Live Hotmail.” As of June 30, 2008, it is no longer possible to access any (Windows Live) Hotmail inbox via Outlook Express. A new program, “Windows Live Mail,” is being offered as a free download to replace OE.
The names are so innocuously similar as to be confusing. “Windows Live Hotmail” is now what everyone has always known familiarly as “Hotmail.” “Windows Live Mail” is the new “Outlook Express-for-accessing-Hotmail.” You download Windows Live Mail onto your computer and it gathers unto itself – like Outlook Express used to – the contents of your Hotmail inbox and, in fact, it synchronizes all the folders in the web-email (Hotmail) and computer-based email (Outlook Express) applications. Like Outlook Express, Windows Live Mail can be used offline for everything except Send and Receive.
I downloaded Windows Live Mail here. It’s roughly 2-1/4 megabytes (not large). When it’s done downloading and installing it automatically, without any prompting or clicking, brings over all your old Outlook Express emails and folders completely intact. That was a job I was dreading and was very pleasantly surprised to see it performed so smoothly and flawlessly in about 20 seconds by Windows Live Mail. I had probably under a hundred emails with a fair number of pictures to be migrated over.
To summarize, I was incredulous when I learned earlier this evening OE no longer supports Hotmail, but everything seems to have turned out well. Windows Live Mail seems well thought out and pleasant looking. Only time will tell though. If this is old news or if I have any facts wrong I would appreciate corrections or suggestions. Was I the only one taken by surprise?
I was in the unfortunate position of having my Windows 2000/Outlook Express/Hotmail-multiple-accounts existence totally hosed, and posted 2 threads about this. Fortunately, M$ backed off of their plans and I can still operate as before.
Anyways, I’d say that maybe yes you are the only one who was surprised. Microsoft sent out an email to all Hotmail users back in April informing customers that Outlook Express would be sunsetted, in other words no longer updated and supported, starting June 30th. Part of this process is dropping Hotmail support for Outlook Express.
All in all this is no big deal for a couple reasons. Outlook Express has been a mediocre product for a long time and Microsoft has basically let it fester for years trying to steer as much of it’s users to regular Outlook as is possible. In short you’re not losing much of value in that program. Secondly and more importantly, Windows Live Mail is essentially Outlook Express 7.0. It’s built off the same underlying code and it does the exact same things.
By installing Windows Live Mail you’re basically just updating OE 6.0 SP2 it’s next iteration, it just happens to have a new name and a new look.
Very little of what Windows Live Mail does happens on your computer, Hotmail and Messenger are both Web applications and Live Mail is just one of many ways to hook into the entire Windows Live experience. All of these features are slowly blending into aspects on one larger online identity. It’s no real coincidence that Windows Live Mail’s interface looks identical to Hotmail’s web based interface. They are essentially the same thing, one is rendered by a web browser and one by a mail client.
Incidentally, can I just say how fucking annoying it is that Windows Live Mail does not have a Calendar function?!?! Windows Live Calendar exists as a web application, would have it been to hard to let Windows Live Mail hook into it so I can get alerts to pop up on my desktop like I can with Outlook?
Your reply does satisfy some of my curiosity concerning whether this change caught others by surprise – it did not, apparently – and for additional insight into the nature of Windows Live Mail. I also wanted to provide a primer for others caught off-guard as I was.
From CNET:
One reason I was taken by surprise by this change is I mainly use Gmail and hadn’t visited Hotmail or Outlook Express in quite some time. Then last night I experienced difficulty opening a picture-laden email sent to my Hotmail address by my sister July 4. My first reaction was to monkey with settings, especially to lessen security settings, thinking that was the reason the pictures weren’t coming through. This got me into such trouble I ended up calling Verizon DSL tech support.
The (otherwise very efficient) woman, Junnel, at their tech support must have noticed soon after I began my description of my problem that I must be unaware of Outlook Express’s having been superceded, but she failed to mention it in the course of our conversation. She got my verizon.net email back up and running and just left it at that. The inevitable second call, this time fielded by Christian, yielded a cryptic recommendation to go to a Windows Live website. So after a solid hour on the phone I began to get some inkling all was apparently not well, Outlook Express-wise, vis a vis Hotmail.
Verizon does have awesome tech support though. They send you a program that lets them take over your computer. Then they fix it themselves remotely. It was cute to watch Junnel’s mouse pointer move around my screen, adjusting settings, writing and sending test emails, successfully receiving test emails, and so on.
I think it may have been possible for me to carry on as before with Outlook Express also, as you seem to end up having done. I have reason to believe the email I had trouble loading from Hotmail into Outlook Express may have been corrupted. It was a very troublesome email in a number of ways, anyway. So it may have just been coincidental I had the trouble with it just at the time, around June 30, Microsoft seemed to say Hotmail would start not working with Outlook Express, and jumped to the conclusion I had to download the new program.
No matter. I’m glad to have Windows Live Mail even though it took all evening to sort the problem out. I’ll at least spend some time with it over the next few months to compare and contrast it with Gmail just out of curiosity.