Yahoo! Mail Blog, UK and Ireland

Well it’s that time of year again. Time for yuletide cheer, mince pies, caroling, decorating trees with lights and baubles and Nigella Lawson’s goose fat roasted potatoes. Oh and the madness of the Oxford Street Shopping circus (pun intended), last minute running around like a headless chicken looking for that perfect gift, and putting on the inches due directly to Nigella’s potatoes.

Photo by Flickr Member fdecomite


Well, to get yourself through all these Christmas parties, I had a couple of thoughts. This first one comes off as being somewhat of a shameless self-promotion. But why not treat yourself to the gift of Mail Plus? Here’s why… Mail Plus comes with some great hang-over blocking features. Just think of it… a clean, no-stress, ad-free environment to ease you into the day after you wake up from that last-call pint. Plus, with Spamguard Plus, you have more protection from those headache causing spam messages. Finally with larger attachment sizes, you’ll never have to bang your head against the table because that great snogging shot of your boss at the Christmas party is too big to send to all your friends.

Second, and only somewhat less of a shameless self-promotion, what about a Flickr Pro account? Unlimited bandwidth to upload photos, unlimited storage, permanent archiving, and much more are the features that come with a Flick Pro account.

Whatever you do to help you make it through the hectic holiday season, me and the entire Yahoo! mail team, wish you the very best this Holiday Season.

Merry Christmas!!!
Andrew – Yahoo! Mail Team

In today’s tip I wanted to draw your attention to a feature of the all-new Yahoo! Mail that – by reading through your feedback – you either love or you find a real pain ;-). Today’s topic is the reading pane.

What is it?
The reading pane allows you to preview messages without having to double-click on them to open them in a new tab or window. When you log into the all-new mail for the very first time, it’s turned on by default. Most people really like it, however there is a small number of your fellow users that think is takes up too much screen real-estate.

Do you love the reading pane?
If you do, here are two tips to help you get the most out of the reading pane.

First you can resize the preview pane to make it suit the size of your screen. Just put your mouse over the dividing line between your message list and the preview pane. When your mouse pointer turns into an up-and-down arrow, click and drag the line to make the pane bigger or smaller. Just like in the screenshot to the right.

Second, for a little more advanced tip for the reading pane, click on the “Options” menu in your Inbox (hint: it’s the link labeled “Options” in the picture below for those folks who aren’t favourable about the reading pane). Then click on “Mail Options”. On that screen you’re going to see this option that let’s you set what happens to the mail message when you look at it in the reading pane:

So if you don’t want the message to get marked as read when you’re viewing it in the reading pane, just select “Never” from the pick-list.

Do you hate the reading pane?
If you do, and I know there is a small minority out there that really doesn’t like the reading pane. Here’s a quick tip I know you’re going to love. Take a look at this picture of the “view menu”. See that “v” next to the menu item “Reading Pane”. That’s a short cut key to show or hide the reading pane at the touch of a key. Try it out. When you’re in your Inbox, just hit the “v” key and see what happens.

Love it or hate it. Those are some quick tips to help you use it the way that suits you best. If you love it, which is most of you, those tips should really come in handy. If you don’t love it, use that “v” key tip to hide and show the preview pane. I think if you use the reading pane more, you might just grow to love it.

Happy emailing,
Andrew – Yahoo! Mail Team

If you’ve been reading this blog for a while, you’ll have noticed that I’ve added a couple of sections for tips to get the most from Yahoo! Mail. There’s a section for Yahoo! Mail Classic as well as the all-new Yahoo! Mail. Right now, it’s just a few, but over the coming weeks, I’ll be adding more.

But I don’t want these tips to be a one way street. And since I know that everyone reading this blog is a Yahoo! Mail power user ;), I bet you have some tips that could help your fellow Yahoo’s. So in a “by the users, for the users” spirit, I’d like to call on some (or all) of you to share some of the features and functions that help you use Yahoo! Mail better.

I’ve created a form for you to share your tips with other readers of the blog. So if you feel like putting pen to paper, and maybe even getting your name in print, fill out this form. Your tip can be about the all-new Yahoo! Mail or Classic Mail or both. It’s up to you.

Our crack editorial team (read me) will go through all the submitted tips and pick out some to feature on the blog. But you’re not doing this just for fame, but for fortune too. So if your tip is featured on the Blog, we might even have some small token of appreciation for your efforts.

Happy emailing.
Andrew – Yahoo! Mail Team