Create Self-Destructing Emails With Bigstring
Ever send an email to someone and wish you could take it back? Perhaps it was to the wrong person, maybe it contained incorrect information, or maybe you were a little angry when you wrote it. With Bigstring, you can call it back or even cause it to self-destruct.
You have a few choices available when it comes to how you want something to be destroyed. You could set it to expire at a certain time, or after how many times the message has been viewed by the recipient.
Making the message hard to print is even possible, although I can’t lay claim to how reliable that is. A workaround that comes to mind is that someone could easily take a screenshot of the message and then print it, but maybe the recipient isn’t aware of that possibility.
How does Bigstring do it?
It converts your message into an image. So if you change your message, the image is retrieved from their server the next time it’s called up to display. When you delete a message, the image is removed, thus the email “shell” remains in the recipients inbox, but the message is no longer visible.
How much does it cost?
Well, even the free basic account has great features everyone would want to use: 2GB of storage, video emails, email tracking, non-forwardable/IP locking email, and lots more. If you want to pay, you’ll get all that and increased storage and a few other bells and whistles.
[tags]email,security[/tags]
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About the Author: Mark Sierra is an online entrepreneur and web publisher. As the owner of StarFrost Media, he continues to add blogs and products to his online portfolio designed to help inform readers on software and blogging, teach them to be more productive, and even learn how to make money online.
Christy | Jul 30, 2007 | Reply
If I understand this concept correctly this could be a lifesaver for those “heat of the moment” emails, lol.
Mark | Jul 30, 2007 | Reply
You got that right!
Brown Baron | Jul 30, 2007 | Reply
Now why am I starting to think of naughty emails?
Benedict Herold | Jul 30, 2007 | Reply
Aren’t you now? lol
Aaron Cook dot Comâ„¢ | Jul 30, 2007 | Reply
Now that’s a darn good idea if I ever did see one!
Shine on,
Aaron
Mark | Jul 30, 2007 | Reply
Yeah, I can see this coming in handy from time to time.
Mark | Jul 30, 2007 | Reply
Ahh, the shy baron has stepped aside but for a brief moment to allow the darker baron to make his presence known. Bloggers beware!
kRUZe | Aug 1, 2007 | Reply
Great Idea, I wonder how many “image” only emails will be tagged as SPAM though?
Mark | Aug 1, 2007 | Reply
Hi kRUZe, yeah, that’s one drawback I see to this whole technology. The other thing is that it causes the recipient to accept the images in order to display them if they have them turned off by default. A slight annoyance, but I think manageable.
Brown Baron | Aug 5, 2007 | Reply
Hehehe it was a momentary slip.
Stephen Cronin | Aug 20, 2007 | Reply
Personally, I’d be annoyed if I received email like this! Do other people feel the same or is it just me?
Another thing that this technology would mean is that you can’t and paste text in the email. I can see this would have benefits for some businesses (and spammers as spam keyword wouldn’t be picked up), but for most people I think it would bring more negatives than positives. My two and a half cents.
Mark | Aug 20, 2007 | Reply
True, I think it should only be used under certain circumstances. Sensitive information perhaps and only on a personal level. Good points Stephen!