Powerinbox is a free program that enhances your web-based email. It adds more functionality for emails from Facebook, Twitter and Groupon by allowing you to interact with those emails in new ways, such as the ability to respond to email notices, watch videos, or comment on photos right from your inbox without having to head to Facebook or other web pages first. It is currently available for use with a variety of browsers, and other ways to use it are not too far off.
Powerinbox is what’s called an ‘PowerApp’ that allows you to interact in new ways with your web-based email. Created by Mark Thazhmon and developed by a first-rate team of programmers and software development specialists, Powerinbox allows lets you perform certain actions from within your email itself.
There are three specific kinds of email that Powerinbox is designed to work with. Facebook, Twitter, and Groupon emails will all have added functionality once you install Powerinbox . First, for those of us who use Facebook on a regular basis, a handy little function of Powerinbox allows you to skip opening the Facebook home page to interact with your email notices. When you get a notice in your email about a photo posted or another comment posted that is of interest, you can make your comments directly in the email window itself and they will go straight to Facebook. As mentioned, you can do this with photos, as well as other news items from your Facebook friends feed. Twitter emails will allow you to make your own tweet on any subject and choose to follow that tweet as well, all from within the email so you won’t have to go to another page to interact with it. Finally, emails from Groupon will have a live countdown timer showing you when a particular deal will expire so you’ll know just how much time you have to take advantage of it without having to leave your email page. You can even choose to hide the Powerinbox menu, show it as a small pull-down box, or show it in a split screen mode that allows for the most page space to be used by both your email and your Facebook or Twitter information.
Currently, Powerinbox is available for use with Google Chrome, Firefox, and Rockmelt browsers. There are plans in the works for making it available on other platforms as well, including Opera, iOS and Android OS, among others. Powerinbox is also in a private alpha stage of development for use with Microsoft Outlook 2007 and 2010 as well. Having the level of integration that includes not just web-mail but client-based email will be the key feature that places Powerinbox head and shoulders above other applications of it’s type. This level of dedication by the developers to bring their app to as many platforms as possible is something we don’t see as often as we’d like and it speaks quite well of Mr. Thazhmon and his team. Consider, as well, that they are continually looking for new talent to add to their team and expand it’s abilities, and we might predict some pretty great things coming from this particular group of developers in the future.
Powerinbox doesn’t do a lot of different things, but what it does, it does quite well. By adding functionality to your emails, and making it so you don’t have to load the Facebook or Twitter or Groupon pages separate from your email, Power InBox saves time as well as reducing the chance of carpal tunnel by means of excessive mouse clicks. It doesn’t seem like saving a few moments here or there by not having to go to a page would be a big deal but over time it does tend to add up. In today’s world of digital go-go, every single action carries weight because time truly is money for most of us. Therefore, any program that installs in moments and winds up saving you time in the short and long runs, is a winner in my book.
A video of Powerinbox in action:
Get Powerinbox here.
Last I checked you could already just reply to a Facebook email to add a comment.
Yup clearly states in Facebook notification emails, “Reply to this email to comment on this status.”