Gmail goes bling, Pageflakes goes cheap

Sidin Vadukut — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 11:47:00 GMT

Gmail, along with most Google products, was all about being minimal and quick. But today we logged into our email account only to find that Gmail was now offering ways of personalizing your account with themes. Yes colours, images, patterns and what have you. If you can't access these options yourself then just click on the setting link on the top right of your Gmail screen and then look for the last option on the list of choices.

More details here on the official Gmail blog.

What are we using? The seaside theme localized for Mumbai, India. (Yes some of the themes localize as well. How Google is that?) But to be honest I've been looking all over Gmail screen and I haven't seen a single bhutta or chaat-wallah yet. And no Mumbai sea-scene is complete without them.

Pageflakes via kwout

Also subtley dropping in additions today was Pageflakes, the online content aggregation *** start page service, like iGoogle and Netvibes, which we migrated to a year or so ago. The service never really took off and the creators sold it off to LiveUniverse a while ago. Perhaps the new owners have decided to commercialize things. Now every tab on the Pageflakes page has a big fat Google Ads block on the top left.

It sucks. One gets so used to the location of ones gaming and tech RSS feed flakes. And now suddenly its 5 ways to get a flat belly. Sigh.

Now we need to run and change our Gmail theme back to the usual. Our eyes have begun to hurt.

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Play Things : Gmail official blog

Gmail goes bling, Pageflakes goes cheap