Website idea not using, would like to share

Hi,
My small internal team came up with this idea, but it wasnt what I was looking for, so Ive decided to share it. This was a completely internal idea (and not one from my previous idea threads). GMAIL went open beta today, so the future is a little uncertain (without proper research) of this idea. Here it is:

Full ajax email website

• Offer free and paid email service
• Web 2.0 looking with a clean interface
• Live ajax email search, like on instantdomainsearch.com

Sidebar

• Last 5 contacts for quick compose
• Advertisements
• Navigation

Under Messages is a Portal

• Set RSS feeds for latest news while you check your mail (all in one)
• Weather
• Search engine bar (for searching web)
• Write notes to yourself
• Integrated image / file hosting

Sort of like a nice mashup of gmail and netvibes.

 

Okay idea, i'd take it up if i had the $$$ to do it properly

 

Yea, the developmental costs are $XX,XXX, but there is lots of free marketing potential. Id take it up to, if GMAIL wasnt around.

 

Excellent idea all around, the integrated file/image hosting is like the icing on the cake.

Gave you some rep

 

Glad you liked it. If anyone starts a site like this, please let me know. I would love to help out and be part of this site anyways I can.

 

Ok it is a good idea but would it really work. I mean the web is full of good ideas and many never make it. The competition around e-mail services is already so harsh that I doubt there’s space for another player.

 

Exactly, and thats why I didnt persue it. However, lots of websites like this get tons of free marketing via techcrunch, digg, and other social bookmarking sites. The site is a gamble, but cool none the less.

 

That's true and anything with Ajax is making a killing nowadays. It seems no site goes live without having some sort of Ajax thingy blinking or whatever.

 

Can a developer give an solid estimate on how much this would cost? Maybe a bunch of us here could get together and work on it.

 

I'm an AJAX/Javascript/PHP developer, some of my work is probably on half of your desktops Too bad it's under NDA. But anyways, with full-time attention and long long days, it would take 2 months to launch the beta for something like this. Without working long, hard hours, it might take up to 4 months to create this. I couldn't even begin to estimate how much someone like myself would charge to create this though.

There are reasons why many decent/pretty good sites never made it. Good sites don't just not make it for no reason.

 

I could do this myself given some time.. the big problem isnt creating it, the problem would be marketing it and paying for it. Paying for a server would be a problem you would need to do as good as the competition so we're talking gigs per email box.

 

Yea, Im not a programmer, but have had some projects done. I figured this would cost $XX,XXX to get written and for such a competitive market, it really wasnt worth the risk. I did send this post to my programmer just to get a quick estimate. He specializes in AJAX/LAMP applications. Anyways and again, hope someone can use this thread. Maybe google will pick it up.

 

good idea ... but it need so much web marketing to achive this kind of project ...

and need lots of dedication too ...

 

some what your thinking is right , but if one work hard and dedicated to his dream then he difinatly got the final destination ...

and internate is a big see there is place for every one ....

 

Overselling

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overselling

99.9% of Gmail users don't use even 1% of their inbox. It's a numbers game.

 

I really dont think the marketing is the major hurdle. Digg frontpage, techcrunch coverage, social bookmarking, newspaper coverage, etc would "could" generate 100,000 uniques within the first week of launch with minimal effort. Now, convincing users to switch to a new mail host is the hard part. Especially with a giant like google opening up gmail.

 

That and server clustering.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_cluster

Have servers set up that only store information and others set up that only display it.

 

some what you are right ... but if you want that gmail persone come to your portal then you should give more user friendly interface then gmail give ...

i mean i m gmail user ... but i didn't like that .. we do label on any email then also it come to inbox it self ... in this fiter things yahoo is good then gmail ...

so you have to think in this manner ... that if you can give good user friendly inteface to uesr the persone will definatly come to your site ...

best of luck ...

 

Yes. This is called value added. For the site to be successful, it must add onto other services by offering more and unique features (file upload, rss news, quick compose) and a better interface. Well said.

 

Well to be honest I don’t know but maybe something like this would work better with specific markets in mind. I for one would never register a new e-mail account because the ones I already have are more than enough (hotmail, Gmail, Sapo (Portuguese))…. That’s why I think that if this was made with certain markets in mind like, China, India or even Brazil it could maybe be a success. The number of internet users in these countries is increasing daily and if done right a potential market could be created and consequently conquered.