Aug. 27, 2001
On the Road Again
By Owen Thomas

mail2web™ lets you keep up with messages anywhere you go

Are you obsessed with staying connected, but having trouble getting your e-mail? mail2web™ can help. The free service lets you view your messages -- to your home or work e-mail address -- anywhere you can get to a secure Web browser.

The service is easy to use: Simply log in with your existing user name and password, and you can read and reply to all of your messages through a simple, uncluttered Web interface. The actual messages remain on your Internet service provider's or office's mail server. If you're worried about privacy, don't be -- the service doesn't store your passwords or e-mail.

mail2web's not the only way to pick up your messages on the road. If you already have a Yahoo Mail or Hotmail account, you can configure it to pick up mail from a home or work address too. Yahoo Mail beats Hotmail on a key feature, however: Once you get home, you can use any e-mail program to tap into Yahoo Mail's servers and download your e-mail permanently; to do the same with Hotmail, you have to use Microsoft's Outlook Express. None of these programs, alas, works with America Online's e-mail service, though you can use AOL.com to check your AOL mail while traveling.