Goowy – What’s this on my shoe?
The idea of having a Flash based email service may dissuade quite a number of potential users from even trying a new service. Other than the visual eye candy, I see no real advantage to utilizing Flash as the backbone of a service. Nonetheless, I gave Goowy a chance and must admit that I walked away impressed. Temporarily. Although the occasional 2 – 3 second load times between switching / saving tasks seemed like eternity, the overall package will suffice to keep average users content.
Goowy aims at providing a completely web based “desktop” environment. After logging into Goowy, users are presented with a “Today” page which provides a summary of your email and a basic RSS reader (no option to import .OPML feeds). Goowy provides a free 100MB email service (@goowy.com & one POP3 account), games (Flash based of course), an address book (with the option to import 500 contacts via .CSV), and calendar.
Again, the major downside which will prevent potential new users is the fact that the service is completely Flash based. Even the “lite” version is Flash based. While a good percentage of browsers these days have the required plugin installed, terminals without Flash will prevent many users from accessing their accounts. Personally, I can’t stand flash. If Goowy plans on appealing to the masses, the “lite” version should be Flash-free. The Gant icons are a nice touch though.
