(Credit:
3D Mailbox)
Back in July, I thoroughly thrashed 3D Mailbox for producing a solution to a problem that doesn't exist. Does anyone really need visual representations of e-mail messages? Isn't e-mail scary enough with all of the bogus sweepstakes offers and pharmaceutical enticements?
Based on the relative success of VisitorVille, an application for visualizing Web traffic, World Market Watch decided to venture into the e-mail space with 3D Mailbox, an application I labeled "extremely useless" this past summer.
The graphics of the free level are adequate; the avatars themselves are less polished yet still fairly attractive. However, the software is a total resource pig. It constantly grabs up to 95 percent of my CPU, unless reined in by adjusting the process' priority Process Explorer, which can't solve the problem completely. ... Read more
(Credit:
World Market Watch, Inc.)
When you first look at 3D Mailbox, it almost seems like a joke, or an article from The Onion. "The world's first 3D e-mail client!" the Web site proclaims. Well, there's a reason for that. Most of us struggle with too much e-mail these days. Taking the time to add 3D animations to each message seems ludicrous...and it is!
3D Mailbox delivers almost exactly what it promises. It creates a 3D world in which your e-mail messages can live...and walk, shower, swim, or even shuffle about aimlessly. When you receive mail in 3D Mailbox, a 3D character representing each message walks in the front gate and talks to the bouncer (who decides if he or she is spam).
By default, the gender of the new avatar is determined by the (supposed) gender of the sender (it thinks Vladimir is a woman's name), and any questionable senders default to female. If the bouncer lets him or her through, the 3D character for each message takes a disinfecting shower, then walks extremely slowly over to the pool, climbs the high-dive platform, jumps in the pool, and swims laps until you decide to read it.... Read more
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