Last summer the University passed up an opportunity to become the first college to use Google Inc.’s Gmail as its e-mail client because of University policies and technical concerns (“University passed on Gmail bid,” ODE Feb. 15). For fans of the increasingly popular Gmail, this decision may come as a shock. But a closer look suggests Computing Center Director Joe St. Sauver made the correct decision in declining Google’s offer.
Even before the University adopted new e-mail policies this fall, e-mail communication had become a critical way for University students and employees to communicate. Now student bills and official messages are sent to uoregon.edu accounts, and students are required to receive and read these messages.
University students and employees today may take for granted the 500 MB of electronic storage space and other amenities they receive through the campus network. This space can hold e-mail messages from uoregon.edu accounts, host personal Web sites or simply store backup files. Official University e-mail accounts can be accessed online or through software such as Outlook and Eudora.
It hasn’t always been this way. Last year students still used longer e-mail addresses and were limited to only 100 MB of storage space. Access to Gladstone was often slow or intermittent.
The University has made improvements by consolidating services through an upgraded Darkwing server. It has also introduced AlphaMail, a home-grown Web-based e-mail client. With a color scheme, layout and features strikingly similar to Gmail, it is clearly the University’s answer to Gmail; it allows users to search old messages, a key Gmail feature.
Gmail still has some advantages. It offers a massive 2.5 GB of space, has a built-in instant messenger feature and supports more languages. However, it also mines e-mail for data to display advertisements corresponding to the content of users’ e-mail. Gmail for domains remains in a beta test phase as well.
Although we support St. Sauver’s decision, we disagree with his assertion that switching would violate University policy. Gmail accounts would become official University accounts if we adopted the Google service. Thus mail from one uoregon.edu account would not be blocked by spam filters.
Security and smooth, consistent access are the key aspects we need in an e-mail system, and the University’s current setup provides them. Contracting with a firm such as Google, which is already under scrutiny for collecting massive amounts of data about users, raises significant security risks, especially at a research university.
Further, switching more than 15,000 students and employees to an untested e-mail system could prove disastrous. Unlike the University, Google is not obligated to support certain features, such as Outlook.
Gmail may be better suited for smaller schools, non-profits and small businesses that cannot finance or support the hardware and software needed for a robust e-mail system. San Jose City College, the first school to adopt Gmail, is providing e-mail to only 10,000 students at a school with fewer resources than the University.
Although we hope the University will heed St. Sauver’s call in a 2004 article for colleges to compete with Gmail and other third-party e-mail providers’ large storage limits, this isn’t the time to switch to Gmail. Instead, the University should continue investing in the open-source AlphaMail client and upgrading its network to accommodate increased space quotas. Only then will it be able to compete with Gmail and similar services being offered by Microsoft and Yahoo! Inc