I was trying to think back to when i started using Gmail for the first time – i have quite a good account name,  i got it back when you had to be invited to use the system. I love how Gmail has changed the way i use email, i love how i can bolt on “labs” stuff which pushes my email forward in ways other email clients only wished they could evolve (Mail Beer Goggles?? Haha!)

Anyway – when it was launched in the UK, it was called Gmail – but as its proper launch got closer another company who had been using the term Gmail in the UK for years piped up and kicked up a bit of a fuss about it. A big lawsuit kicked off, and google ended up changing all UK sign ups to @googlemail.com email account – despite @gmail.com still working for all UK users as well!

It appeared that they had underestimated the popularity of the Gmail name!

I recently noticed that gmail.co.uk has stopped resolving the website for the contensis content management system email, and instead just shows a error page. I did a whois and suprise suprise;

Domain name:
gmail.co.uk

Registrant:
Google Inc.

I wonder how much they paid for that domain name? First registered in 1998 as well, so its not like to sat on it as soon as they heard google might be doing emails!

Seems to be the way copyright violations like this are solved in this world – buy out the competition! I wonder if they’ll do the same for Gmail.de?

Also, i wonder if i’ll soon be able to have an @gmail.co.uk email address? Now that would be awesome!