A new approach to Gmail

Taken from:
http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9227899/Fluent_review_An_innovative_new_interface_for_Gmail

While my primary email is Microsoft Outlook - for Campus Email.  (And ... my contacts, calendar, groups, archives, etc.).  My secondary email - for non-professional communications is GMail by Google.

Now, to me, gmail is functional - it seems to filter out a whole lot of spam (you should check the spam folder periodically for junk - and for recipes for using SPAM - the spiced ham / meat product).  Okay ... not flashy - but functional.

This article talks of three Google employees who left Google and have developed "Fluent" as a new interface for Gmail:

The second you get into Fluent, you see Gmail in a whole new way. Fluent shows your messages as a stream of conversations, making the experience more like browsing through Facebook than trudging through email. While Gmail requires you to click on a message to open it before replying, Fluent's Reply box is right on the Inbox screen, akin to a comment thread on a Facebook post.

You never have to open a message to view responses or add your own response.
Gone are the increasingly superfluous functions Google has tacked onto Gmail, such as "Invite a friend," Google+ functions, etc. -- not to mention the ads. In their place, Fluent provides a minimalistic gray navigation bar on the left of the screen and a simple white toolbar on top.

According to the article, there is  a two month wait to be able to get the interface and it seems like a nice approach (as they say more like Facebook, than email).

Maybe I can try it out (get on their list for two months first).