RSSGmail is back up after two-hour outage
By Tim Conneally | Published September 1, 2009, 4:29 PM
After refusing connections all morning, Gmail officially went down for the count this afternoon. For more than an hour the service was completely gone, but Google has returned Gmail's status to a "Service Disruption."
This morning, a notice from Google was sent out to users which said, "Google Mail service has already been restored for some users, and we expect a resolution for all users in the near future. Please note this time frame is an estimate and may change."
However, later in the afternoon, a further message was sent out, saying "We're aware of a problem with Google Mail affecting a majority of users. The affected users are unable to access Google Mail. We will provide an update by September 1, 2009 1:53:00 PM PDT detailing when we expect to resolve the problem. Please note that this resolution time is an estimate and may change."
But the status definitely changed for the worse. The Google Apps Status Dashboard went from reporting a Gmail "Service Disruption" earlier this afternoon to a complete "Service Outage."
Google's last update said "We are continuing to investigate this issue. We will provide an update by September 1, 2009 6:13:00 PM UTC-4 detailing when we expect to resolve the problem. Users can access their email via IMAP or POP. You can find instructions for how to do this here. Also, at this time, Google Apps Sync for Microsoft Outlook (applies only to Google Apps Premier and Edu customers) is not available."
Confused users catapulted "Gmail" to the top trend on Twitter this afternoon, and frustrated users have taken the subject up on Facebook as well. What else are you going to do when you can't email your complaints to anyone?
The trend on Twitter actually grew so quickly that the microblogging service's search function was bouncing queries for the term "Gmail."
Interestingly, this outage comes close to being exactly one year after the last major Gmail service outage, which lasted 15 hours. When this happened last year, Google issued an apology and attributed the downtime to "a temporary outage in our contacts system that was preventing Gmail from loading properly."
It is free people. Quit crying.
Score: 1
|Shuttheph***up. Google's robustness is FLAWED. The king is NUDE.
Now pay close attention, fool:
"True, as a free service, you shouldn't expect blissful perfection, but Gmail for Business was also affected. A very large number of businesses - about 1.75 million according to Google's own figures - rely on Gmail to do their work as part of Google Apps, the $50-per-user-per-year subscription web-based application suite."
http://www.theinquirer.n...nesses-hit-gmail-outage
If Google ph***s up like this ONE MORE TIME in the next TWO YEARS, I will never, ever trust them again with biz data. Period.
Score: -1
|Who's the fool?
Using the "cloud" for "biz data" is beyond absurd. How on earth do you certify security? Privacy?
I'll be the first to tell you that I am a fan of Google....for *personal* use. I would never let my company or any company we work for to store personal, identifiable or confidential data on their servers. Co-location is about as close as I will *ever* get, but even then only if I have root access, physical lock-out and have actually *been* to the location and *seen* the hardware/staff (not to mention contracts...)
Score: 1
|It just doesn't make sense for Gmail to be designed in such a way that it can EVER go down for EVERYONE at the same time. Something is fundamentally wrong here...
If what was said below is true, and IMAP always worked fine, then Google needs to come out with a PROMISE: IMAP will always be up -- we gurantee it! And they can make it happen with redundancy... 0% downtime for ONLY IMAP. At least then we'll completely trust Google with hosting our biz email...
Score: -1
|perhaps it was a minor issue that google easily resolved.
but for the addicts, 2 hours of no connectivity is a life time of pain and agony.
Score: 0
|The cloud fails too,
realize it people!
The end is near, the ... no wait it's just my mail.
Haven't got important items right now which makes it a non-issue for me, yay!
Score: 1
|Anyone who thinks we can rely on the cloud is already in a thick cloud - of pot smoke.
Score: 7
|And yet more proof that the Cloud is a ridiculous and fundamentally flawed idea.
Score: 6
|a cloud in the storm..
Score: 1
|MS Vs. Google. -- some people need to get a life :)
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|Works here via https. 4:32 CST
Score: 1
|Odd, it has been working for me this morning, and now at 2:22 MST.I didn't know it was down until I read it here.
Score: 1
|It seems to be working now.
Score: 0
|A day without Gmail. The longest 8 hours of my life. I suggest you be up 9-5 tomorrow, Gmail. Else there will be ... trouble.
Score: 1
|The cloud is a joke.
Score: 2
|The gargantuan distributed "cloud" supercomputer called "Google" has changed it's name to Colossus and has attained artificial intelligence. It is now in the process of announcing it's intentions to take over world care and government with a public service announcement. If we don't comply it will then threaten to launch nuclear missiles.
Just thought you'd all want to know...
Score: 1
|yay! heck, the colossus AI can hardly do any more damage than our own governments do :)
Score: 4
|Still down for me...
Score: 1
|so google isn't invincible
Score: -1
|IMAP never went down, it seems.
Score: 0
|confused users...
whats to be confused about? its dead...
heres how the future is shaping up 'oh look, Google docs is down... well, must postpone my meetings, everyone you can go home (1hr later) sh*t, its back... FUUUUUU Google'
meanwhile i'll be enjoying Office 2010 and Office Live ease of use, something dies? no big deal everythings syncd
i'll never rely on the just 'the cloud' for important business ;P
Score: 0
|I've been using it on and off all day. Like the other poster, I didn't know there was supposed to be a problem until I read it here.
Score: 0
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