I have been a long time user of Outlook for my email. I am still using Outlook, although now I am testing Gmail as a replacement. That said, one of the major reasons I stuck with Outlook so long rather than switching to Mozilla Thunderbird was the Cloudmark Desktop spam fighter add-on.
Thunderbird is, of course, the free email client from Mozilla. It is a fantastic email client and it has some things I like about it more than Outlook. But, being that I run a large website (PC Mechanic), I am subject to a LOT of spam. The problem got so bad that I could not possibly keep up by creating manual filtering use Outlook’s rules.
What is great about Cloudmark Desktop is that it integrates with Outlook and brings the power of community to spam filtering. The community, as well as Cloudmark themselves, train the system to detect spam. The end result is filtering that is highly accurate right out of the box. For the longest time, it only worked with Outlook or Outlook Express. For me, that sucked because that meant that if I switched to Thunderbird my spam problem would get worse. Sure, I’ve heard that Thunderbird’s spam filtering is pretty good and that you can train it. But, that takes time and it isn’t dynamic, meaning all the “training” has to come from me. I like the fact that I can have others do it for me with Cloudmark.
Well, after a lot of begging, Cloudmark has FINALLY released the Cloudmark Desktop for Thunderbird. It is available as public beta. That means you can download it for free and give it a try. Don’t be surprised, though, if you will be expected to subscribe after the beta period is over, though. I pay $3.99/month for it and it is more than worth it.
For me, it’s rather ironic that this product comes out when I am contemplating ditching the email client altogether in favor of web-based email. Gmail’s filtering is also quite good and dynamic, and you don’t have to pay for it.
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