Xoopit turns Gmail into a gorgeous media browser

All these media-hosting and social-networking services are great, but there's been a relatively untapped resource in tracking what you're sharing: your e-mail in-box. Today a new service called Xoopit is opening up in private beta to Gmail users who are looking to not only sort through the deluge of photos, videos, and other files that make their way into your in-box, but add ways to share that media with social networks you're already using.

Xoopit's answer is to have you install a small browser plug-in and give it the credentials to your Gmail account. It will crawl over all the data, and within 24 hours the entirety of your in-box, sent mail, and mailbox archive will be able to be browsed and sorted through in a whole new (and I think far simpler) manner. While Gmail has its own search function, it's not so good when it comes time to browse and interact with media from those search results like Google does with Web queries.

With Xoopit installed you can view photos sent to you like a photo slide show. It does the same for videos and files too.

(Credit: CNET Networks)

I've only had it indexing my in-box for the past hour or so, but it's already made my in-box a lot more useful. The latest media can be browsed in a little thumbnail stream on the top of the page, which reminds me a lot of a similar feature in Flock. Additionally, photos, videos, and files can be viewed off-site at Xoopit.com. It takes a similar approach to DropBox (review) in giving you a reverse chronological stream of your media that can be viewed, downloaded, and managed while away from Gmail. The same interface is actually a part of Gmail once you install the plug-in, so users will feel right at home in either location.

I must say Xoopit is off to a really great start. For a new app, I found very little to gripe about. It succeeds in two major areas: one in speed, since it doesn't slow down your in-box whatsoever, and the other in ease of use. The user interface is incredibly intuitive and provides a far better media viewing experience than Gmail does on its own.

We have a little more than 200 invites for Webware readers. To get yours click here.

[ronnopiano]

Sounds cool, but just tried to download & was given an error. Tried again, you guessed it, error. The third time I tried to signup via their website rather than webware link, (remember "webware" as code) and still no luck!

[jkxoopit]

This is JK, one of the founders of Xoopit. We got overwhelmed with signup requests over the last hour and a bit. Try as we did to avoid this, we got a tremendous number of signups in the last hour and need to do a quick maintenance to keep things humming again. We'll be back up in a jiffy.

[jkxoopit]

Hi, this is JK from Xoopit. Just wanted to let webware readers are back up (and have been for a while). Sorry for not getting the new comment in here earlier.

[richardrossin]

JK, what is my risk of giving you total access to my gmail account (address and password)? Troubles me some.

[xxdesmusxx]

As much as I'd like to give this a try, there is no chance in hell I would hand over my Gmail login information to some random company. There MUST be a better way to do this without having over private/sensitive information. Call me paranoid if you want, but I think I'll pass.

[rabidwolv]

I am very tempted but like xxdes I am a bit worried about handing over my login information.

[nyninja]

I think one important consideration in all this dialog around credential sharing is the fact that NO email aggregation play created to-date works without credential sharing, be it the majors (Gmail, Yahoo plus, AOL, etc.) or early stage companies (Zimbra (pre acquisition), etc.. These guys are no different, in terms of living with the constraints of current authentication schemes.

[millaciousmills]

I agree with the above comments about security. This is how Xoopit's EULA addresses password sensitivity: "You agree that you are solely liable and legally responsible for all actions taken via your password, whether or not made with your knowledge or authority. We employ industry standard encryption methods to protect your password. If you suspect that someone may have obtained your password, you should change your password."

My financial information and other sensitive info flows through my gmail account. I'm supposed to turn over the keys to that account when Xoopit's only claim to security responsibility is "We employ industry standard encryption methods to protect your password."? I feel more comfortable with Google than a startup that "was founded around the baristas of San Francisco", so thanks but no thanks, but I'll continue to use Gmail search to find vids and pics.