Thunderbird - It's an albatros.

It's as old as the browser side of Mozilla so if it was going to be a success it would have followed in the wake of Firefox.

Spinning it off as a lone entity is just a measure to get rid of unwanted baggage. Your choice of web browser has become fashionable/religious whereas no one cares about email and still think only geeks bang on about using alternatives.

Are there any alternative email clients for Windows that are a success?

At the moment there aren't that many add ons for T-Bird, I remember having to hunt high and low to get hold of a backup/restore product for it, although this has now improved, they still have a way to go.

tbh i tried thunderbird a couple of times but it always seemed like a half-ass attempt of a software. I hope this time the attempt will be more proffessional and complete

Thunderbird would be bloody great if I knew how to send mail via ALT + S

Is there a way?

Thats the only reason I dont use the dam thing.

HAHAHA yes they do...

I'd put money on it that google 'suggested' Mozilla should dump thunderbird or 'accidents' might happen...

Come on, we all know Google is Mozillas biggest contributer, isnt one of them even on the board?

Still could be a good thing I guess but I'm rather suspicious about the decision

Please don't let them add instant messaging and other crap to my Thunderbird. I really enjoy having a quick, friendly, reliable e-mail client that does e-mail and does it well, instead of one of those "what other annoying features can we cram in?" communications software packages.

Certainly Firefox is only Thunderbird's older sibling by a few days or something, because I certainly recall a time when I had Thunderbird v0.1 installed alongside Firebird (Or was it Phoenix at that point? I can't remember) v0.6.

And then all the way along to Thunderbird v0.1 alongside Firefox v2.0. Because, you know, Thunderbird just worked. A count of how many people are downloading the new version isn't always the best way to look at the popularity of software.

As long as they stick to the minimalist values and simply improve what they've got - it can use a bit of fixing. I've been using Thunderbird almost as long as Firefox (Phoenix/Firebird). It does email and RSS and that's all I want. What am I missing out on that these other great email apps have?

I look forward to a replacement of T'bird and its add-ons - have you ever tried the British English dictionary? It's embarrassing. I offer the incorrectly spelled word 'beleiveing' as a test case...

I look forward to a replacement of T'bird and its add-ons - have you ever tried the British English dictionary? It's embarrassing. I offer the incorrectly spelled word 'beleiveing' as a test case...

I love FF, I'm using it right now.

Thunderbird, by contrast, is a clunky amateurish bug-ridden POS which I won't even consider reinstalling on a test machine until they sort out the myriad problems and fixes that would elevate it to the level of being a very badly implemented Outlook Express clone.

Spinning it off to an arms-length company won't make a blind bit of difference, they need to redevelop it from scratch and throw away every last line of code that came in from Netscape Communicator.

And please don't mention the 'Add-Ons' I can download to implement what should be core functionality - a pig with lipstick on is still a pig. I've got many many better things to do with my life than spend ages searching for a plug-in which will handle Usenet with any degree of basic intelligence for example.