I am not really a big fan of Outlook. I practically loathe Microsoft products, and if only I can liberate myself from Microsoft's stranglehold of the Enterprise Application industry, I would. And for me to do that, I would have to resign from a job that pays the bills. If I can blog full time, and earn a decent living out of it, I would have done that a long time ago, but alas, it was not meant to be. At least, not yet. Anyway, Xobni has just released an invite-only beta software that adds on Outlook's features, making it better. This new add-on, called Xobni Insight, is touted the social networking software for email. The following is my take on their features. Lightning-fast email search Outlook has a bad reputation when it comes to searching email messages. Xobni says it can search email messages in 0.3 seconds. Of course, I'm quoting what they said on their site. I'm speculating here that I think this would be possible for POP3 accounts. What about for IMAP accounts, or accounts from an Exchange server? If this software can do what GMail has done for email searching, especially for Exchange server accounts, it would be great. Speeding things up when accessing email messages from an Exchange server account would definitely increase productivity in a work environment. Phone numbers extracted from email signatures This would be great, but it would only be beneficial to really, really, REALLY disorganized people. How can you call yourself a professional if you don't even know where to get your client's/contact's phone number? Email Analytics From what it says on the website, you will know what time of the day your contacts usually check their email. And vice versa. This feature is basically what makes Xobni Insight a social network software. Some people may be fine with this. I am not. Call me paranoid, but this is creepy. This just makes my decision to cancel my subscriptions to social network sites much easier. Quick Attachment Discovery This feature is great. All the attachments one contact has ever sent to you will be listed and you can immediately refer back to it. What I want to know is, would it work, and nicely, with Exchange server accounts? It would be great if it did. Navigate your inbox by people Outlook 2003, afaik, can already do this. Xobni Insight takes it to the next level. By letting you "quickly identify a contact's manager, business partner, or assistant." Nice. More of the snoopy goodness that is social networking. No thanks. I'm fine with Outlook's feature, thank you. Threaded Conversations One word. GMail. Personal Assistant "Schedule appointments with a click of a button - Insight automagically finds open slots in your busy schedule." That is, assuming there are no reschedules. What happens when a meeting is rescheduled to a date you have already scheduled with another meeting using Insight? Would Insight send an email asking to reschedule your affected meeting? That would take a human brain. Would Insight then send an email to cancel the affected meeting to a later time? That would be more plausible, but of no use for me. This maybe more beneficial to executives with a very hectic schedule. And it would only show that your priorities are screwed up. Obviously, this is not an official review of the software. I haven't tested, and will not be able to test, the software mentioned above. For one thing, I don't have a personal Exchange server to test with. Another would be the fact that my notebook is currently in the shop, getting repaired, or resurrected, from a BSOD. And lastly, I'd rather use Google Apps for all my organizing needs. Liking 2 out of 7 isn't really bad. It's just how Xobni Insight appeals to me. Much of my information, personal and professional, is already "out on the ether." My online behavior is already tracked by a number of websites. I don't need to let my email behavior be known to the public. I guess it's just the paranoid in me talking. Don't get me wrong, though. Xobni, in my opinion, is doing one heck of a job trying to get Outlook do what it was supposed to do, make organizing stuff a breeze. I just don't think they should add a "social network" flavor to whatever they're cooking up. Even if it is the trend nowadays.