Although ASU officials continue to advocate the move to Gmail, ASU students have more time to switch, as the phase out of EMMA e-mail is pushed back from
January 2007 to later this spring.
ASU officials are waiting for a tool from Google that would allow the University to move old student EMMA e-mails to their new Gmail accounts, said University Technology Vice President Kari Barlow.
Once the Google tool is received, tested and used, the University will no longer actively use EMMA, a homegrown e-mail developed by ASU, Barlow said.
There are no specific dates on receiving the tool or the official move, but it should occur in the spring semester, Barlow said.
Currently, if a student moves to the new Gmail account, any old e-mails will remain in EMMA unless the student moves them manually, Barlow said.
Any new e-mail sent to the old EMMA accounts can be forwarded to the new Gmail accounts automatically, Barlow said.
"One of the big advantages of Gmail is more space," Barlow said.
Gmail has two gigabytes of space compared to 60 megabytes, she added.
In addition, Gmail has chat and calendar features and is more versatile for the users, Barlow said.
Currently, about 15,000 ASU e-mail users have moved to the new Gmail accounts, said University Technology Officer Adrian Sannier.
Economics sophomore Erik Buttram is one of those students.
"It was painless and pretty seamless," Buttram said.
History freshman Max McCauley said he has always liked Gmail.
"It is user friendly and has a lot of storage," McCauley said.
The move allows University technology resources to focus on other educational services for students, such as improving the ASU directory and digital library, rather than managing e-mail, Sannier said.
Letting Google take care of services that are part of their core expertise allows universities to devote more resources to the areas that are part of theirs, said Rajen Sheth, Google project manager.
In order for ASU to use Gmail, it pays about a $10,000 annual fee for maintenance and help-desk questions, Sannier said.
Casey Thomas, public relations junior, said she switched to Gmail over winter break because she had problems receiving mail in her EMMA account.
"I liked the fact I could keep my old asu.edu account and did not have to tell everyone my new one," Thomas said.
However, she said she is concerned Gmail may be subject to virus protection updates because Google, as a company, is so big.
In December 2006, an external blog reported Gmail had a vulnerability in which a person's contact list could be viewed.
However, Google fixed vulnerabilities on their video and other products within 24 hours and no users, to Google's knowledge, were impacted, Sheth said.
The Google vulnerability had no impact on ASU Gmail, Barlow said.
Sannier said he is fully supportive of Google.
"I believe [Google] has the safest, most reliable alternative for ASU to put its mail," Sannier said.
Until the official move occurs later this spring, students like molecular biosciences and biotechnology senior Ben Emesowum have the option to retain their current EMMA accounts.
"I haven't moved over yet because I am comfortable with the current system," Emesowum said. "I'll move over when I am forced to."
Reach the reporter at: jeffrey.mitchell@asu.edu.
