Hotmail.com – Free Webmail

Hotmail is one of the oldest and free web based email services.It is still operated as a free service by one of world’s leading technology companies, Microsoft.

Hotmail was founded by Sabeer Bhatia and Jack Smith. It was launched in July 1996 as “HoTMaiL”, where its name and capitalization refers to HTML, the encoding language used by the World Wide Web (WWW). While it was known as MSN Hotmail after microsoft acquired it from the founders, it is currently known as “Windows Live Hotmail”.

Windows Live Hotmail service offers 5GB of storage that expands as necessary, patented security measures, Ajax technology, and integration with other microsoft products like Windows Live Messenger, Spaces, Calendar, and Contacts. Hotmial is available in 36 different languages.

Features of Windows Live Hotmails:

The following are the features of Windows Live Hotmail:

• An integrated audio player which plays voicemails or MP3 audio clips after scanning the file for viruses.
• Hotmail integrates with other Windows Live services. For example, users can see if their Windows Live Messenger contacts are online and start instant messaging conversations from Hotmail. Integration with Windows Live People provides the ability to have contact information kept automatically up-to-date, as well as providing the What’s New feed of users found on their Windows Live Profile. Windows Live Calendar will also be accessible through the Hotmail interface and meeting requests are automatically added to the user’s calendar.
• The redesign of Hotmail was centered around an Outlook-style appearance, with a reading pane to view the inbox and messages at the same time, drag-and-drop functionality, keyboard selects for using the Ctrl or Shift keys to select messages and right-click context menus. As with Outlook, the reading pane can be displayed at the side of messages, below them, or not at all.
• Security features built into Hotmail include Windows Live OneCare virus scanning, SenderID, SMTP Authentication, phishing heuristic detection, Bonded Sender, mailing list detection, and forwarding detection.Potentially unsafe mail is caught by Hotmail and it does not open the message or allow access to an attachment until the user requests that it do so. This is intended to reduce the success of phishing attempts. A “safety bar” is positioned above each message as a notification to the user as to whether the sender is known and if the mail content is potentially dangerous.
• As with Office programs like Microsoft Word, Hotmail has an inbuilt spell checker to check the spelling of words as they are typed. Misspelled words are underlined in red and a right-click displays a list of suggestions. If, however, the user’s browser has a built-in spell checker, this feature is disabled and the browser’s spell-checker is used instead.
• Hotmail offers a choice of different themes. Users can choose from a range of different predefined Windows Live themes. The theme chosen will be used across all other Windows Live services.

Check out other Microsoft products like Windows Live Messenger 8.5 and Windows Live Messenger 9.