The pros and cons of Gmail’s newest app “Dmail”
Ever send an email and realize that your tone came across completely differently than you meant it to? Or complete a memo and hit send only to notice you spelled your supervisor’s name wrong (yikes!)? OR, send an e-mail with some super important information that you don’t want hanging out in the cloud? Well, Gmail has your back! The latest and greatest from Google is an app that allows you to send emails that self destruct . . . if you want them to. You thought the un-send button was some good news, but it just keeps getting better and better. Google cleverly named their new extension Dmail and we’ve broken down the sweet, sweet pros for you as well as the cons of this new techno-development. Here’s the breakdown and because I like positivity — let’s start with the pros.
Pros
The app allows you to encrypt and decrypt your own emails with the touch of a button. This button is called revoke email and once an email is revoked no one can read it anymore. Not even you! Goodbye embarrassment. Right?
You can set a timer to destroy an email. If you need to send really sensitive materials (account numbers etc.) then you can set a timer on your email so that it is destroyed in a certain amount of time.
Unlike the unsend feature, you don’t have the same time constraint with this extension. You can revoke an email long after it’s been sent — maybe you think better of your angry message over the weekend and decide on Sunday night that your boss really shouldn’t read it. Well now you can take it back super easily (as long as they didn’t already read it) and although the person will know you sent it, you’ll be saved from whatever ills could have come from them reading it.
Cons
It doesn’t really work if the recipient doesn’t have Gmail. If your friend, S.O. or co-worker doesn’t use Gmail (maybe they are stuck in the stone age with, say, an AOL account) the revoke feature won’t QUITE work.
The recipient will also be able to tell if you revoke the email. Although the button “destroys” the email, it really only destroys everyone’s access to the content. The email will remain in the mailbox but will contain a message saying that the message is destroyed and can no longer be accessed.
Although this new feature is pretty cool, the unsend button might still be our best bet. That said, it’s super exciting to see new technology from Google and we love how they keep fine-tuning the whole email process.
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[Image via Dmail]
