Do you ever think what will be if GMail was designed by Microsoft? Here some ideas:
This is the original one of GMail inbox snapshot.

First of all, we need to rebrand the application name to something longer. Let’s call this Windows Live Gmail, and add some of the visual elements connected with Windows. Also, as in Hotmail, there needs to be less space for the email subjects to make place for a reading pane, which is full of verbose explanatory help text*:
To this:

Then, this:

There’s still not enough banner space available though, so let’s add a top row for ads and move the rest a bit more down. Also, to go back to the real Microsoft spirit, the inbox will now carry a maximum of 2 MB of messages – that was the amount Hotmail offered when Gmail was released with 1 GB in April 2004. Also, Microsoft-style, the actual start page of this service will not be the inbox, but a “welcome” splash screen. Please imagine the ads blinking at this point:

Plus, to increase user lock-in, let’s get rid of the “sign out” link. I’m also putting less emphasis on search, moving the box to the bottom right and replacing it with a dog:
Finally this:

via BlogoScoped















