Let the Email Wars Begin

Rediff takes on Google. Who would have thought an Indian media company would be the one to join the 1 Gig freemail world, upping the ante over Microsoft and Yahoo? Reuter's Narayan Madhavan finds plenty of skeptics, all of whom seem to be looking at it as a simple revenue-earning business model. But I wonder if this is more like branding gimmick. People who may never have heard of Rediff before might now be paying attention. It looks like even some Rediff writers might have been a bit surprised by the move. I love how the default country setting in the form is not the United States, but India. Can I no longer make friends by getting them Gmail invites?

Update:
I forgot to mention something which regular readers will know, for the sake of full disclosure. I'm a bit partial to Gmail because my sister works for Google. Also, I've just given Rediffmail a spin, and it doesn't have any of the threading or search features Gmail does. Actually, considering I have every manner of free email account, it doesn't really make sense to think of these services as being in competition with each other. It will be interesting to see what people will think of doing with these new huge freemail accounts.