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Now that Google’s giving away more and more Gmail accounts — current users’ accounts were recently topped up with six more invitations each — everyone’s offering to invite friends, acquaintances, etc. One kind soul offered accounts on an e-mail list I participate in. Others use their blogs to practice their benevolence. An alliance has even sprung up to give away Gmail accounts to our troops.

I’ve had a Gmail account (or two) for quite some time, but I have to admit I haven’t been making such offers. The reason? Gmail has a lot of problems/drawbacks.

Some examples:

• Can’t change your address/Use existing addresses. On my Yahoo! Mail (granted, I pay $19.99/year for it), I can use any address I own. I can receive at those addresses (through forwarding) and mail from them. There’s no need to be tethered to any Yahoo! branding, as there is with Gmail.
  
• No POP access. It’s been said before many times. You can’t retrieve your Gmail for reading elsewhere. (Though I have seen talk of an app. that’s said to address this.)
  
• No disposable addresses. My Yahoo! account lets me create any number of disposable e-mail addresses to give out when the occasion calls for it.
  
• Lack of attention to spam. Gmail’s spam filter — when I was using it regularly a while back — seemed to let through quite a bit more than my other filters. Also, (and I watch these things), I don’t see anyone from Gmail participating in any of the anti-spam disussions taking place among major e-mail providers.
  

The main problem with Gmail, though, isn’t any particular failing. It’s just the fact that it doesn’t have a unique compelling value proposition. I can get everything I need with Yahoo! for twenty bucks a year. As Matt blogged a while back: “…all these people talking about how 30mm people are going to switch over to it must be seeing something I don’t.”

P.S. All that said, if anyone still wants a Gmail account, I will part with a few. (I need to hold on to some for testing.) E-mail me at theriver (at) mcnigel.com. Just please let me know why you want one.

Nate posts about a somewhat alarming demonstration given at a recent Tacoda event for publisher clients.

The gist of the issue is this… publishers targeting on behavioral can potentially use ad serving data (including click-through data) as targeting criteria. Therefore, one could target an ad for a cellular phone company to just those users who’d clicked on another phone company’s campaign. The implications for advertisers are obvious.

As Nate puts it: …if I was an advertiser, this would scare the hell out of me. At the very least, this example should make advertisers very conscious of the language on their behavioral IOs. I could also see this type of data misuse convincing advertisers that it’s too early to jump into behavioral at all.

UPDATE: I should add that Tacoda’s Dave Morgan stepped up in the middle of the demo — clearly understanding the incendiary nature of the issue — and made clear that the company didn’t advocate the use of such data for such purposes, but was simply discussing it.

I have to admit the thought of using ad serving/clicking data in behavioral is new to me — but it’s absolutely something the industry should be thinking about seriously.

NYT has a story (free reg) about Silicon Valley’s recovery. As I’m headed that way and expect to be spending some time in SV, I’m especially interested in getting the pulse of what’s going on.

Telling quote: “Silicon Valley is no longer at death’s door,” said Mike Moeller, director of corporate communications at Hewlett-Packard. “People are no longer in shock. But is Silicon Valley back? That’s like saying a patient who was in diabetic coma for several years is healthy again because he can lift his head and open his eyes.”

T-Mobile has introduced “My Album” and “My Journal” features, basically to encourage photoblogging and online photo albums for multimedia phones. Pretty fascinating stuff. Tried to post photos to a Blogger blog by sending a multimedia message to the e-mail posting address, but it didn’t work. And, yes, this means I’ve worked out some of the e-mailing features on my new phone, although I’m still not satisfied at how it all works. Still quite kludgy, but we’re getting there.

(PR) People got on our backs last time we presented The ClickZ Marketing Excellence Awards, saying they weren’t aware nominations were going on…. so here’s another link. Only one more week to nominate your favorite tools, technologies, campaigns, etc. We’ll be announcing winners in conjunction with the Jupiter/ClickZ AdForum at the end of July.

We’ve added categories this year like “best business blog” so don’t automatically assume there’s no category in which you (or your company) might be recognized. Check it out.

Brad‘s wife is learning to blog. Since my husband announced this morning that “I think it’s time to start my blog,” I found Amy’s experience intriguing.

I think Michael will follow my lead and use Blogger rather than MT or TypePad, since it’s easy and free. The not-so-secret ingredient for blogging success that both Amy and Michael seem to have is this: passion. For Michael, it’s a passion for football (aka soccer) — both playing and watching.

The fact that both of our non-techie spouses are interested in blogging suggests something of a tipping point. Then again, maybe it just suggests Brad and I talk so much about blogging that our spouses have gotten curious. Time will tell.