As the session went along, one of the speakers recommended using a second, web-based, email account for non-essential stuff. That way you don’t have mailing lists, newsletter subscriptions, Google News alerts, or other non-essential email keeping you from finding what you need in your Outlook, or interrupting you with a new mail alert. (Although they suggested killing that too, in all fairness.)

Anyhow, that got me thinking. Lots of places block access to web based email as a matter of policy. I began to wonder if unblocking that would put a small dent in the amount of email that our users are storing, and handling? After all, I know there are mailing lists I would rather subscribe to in Gmail, but don’t because I can’t access it at work.  That means, at least in my case, there’s a significant amount of email being handled by our Exchange server, and having to be dealt with somehow, in my Outlook, as opposed to just being over in Gmail, and me looking at it occasionally.

Now, I know the common refrain is that web based email account are a security risk, but is the risk that large, and does blocking access to web mail really mitigate that risk in a significant way? For example, years ago people decided to block it because of the virus risks, but just about all major web mail services do anti-virus scans on any attachments, and even then,  your desktop AV product should scan any attachments when you try to open them. So, to my mind, blocking might decrease the chance of getting a virus attachment slightly compared to depending on these other tools, but doesn’t make that much of a difference.

Now I know that’s hardly the only concern, but it’s just an example. Anyway, what do you think? I know some of you guys block web mail, and I’m sure some of you don’t. I also know almost all of us are struggling with what to do with all that email coming into, and being stored on, our networks and mail servers, so I’m curious about what you all think? Would allowing access put a dent in that, or is it not worth the increased risk?

Unfortunately, sending and replying to mail is often one of the most-used features when you are on the road. So what are you to do? You could always use the web mail access provided by most ISPs or use web-based services such as Gmail or Windows Live Mail (formerly Hotmail.com). Of course, this can be cumbersome when you simply want to reply to email you receive.

So, in my own laptop setup, I have done the following:

• Set up a free Gmail account
• Configure a new email account in your email program
• For this new account, set the Reply-To address to your standard email account, i.e. me@mydomain.com

Now, when I am confronted with an error when I try to send mail, I can change the outgoing email account to my Gmail account and, since Gmail uses different, usually unblocked ports, the mail will be sent. Also, by setting the Reply-To address, any replies will automatically be re-directed back to my standard email account. This allows me to work in my normal fashion, even when the local network puts roadblocks in my way.

Gmail recently added IMAP services to their offering, so now it is even easier to send and receive email while you are on the road.
For more great information on Gmail, check out fellow Friends in Tech member, The Gmail Podcast, hosted by Chuck Tomasi.