Elon Musk has hinted that he plans to use his own email service, XMail, to compete with Gmail, Outlook, and other services.
Mr. Musk, who rebranded Twitter as X after purchasing it for $44 billion in 2022, is known for dropping hints about upcoming projects and making cryptic remarks.
In response to a question on the social media site posed by Nate Mcgrady, “When we making XMail?” Mr. Musk responded, “It’s coming.”
However, Mr Mcgrady’s profile states he is an engineer at X.
Mr Musk did not follow up the message, or share any other details, but many of his followers shared their excitement at the news.
Chansoo Byeon replied: ‘I will migrate from Gmail on day 1.’
It’s coming
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 23, 2024
Taking on Gmail, the world’s biggest email provider, would be a major ask, but the SpaceX and Tesla CEO has never shied away from a challenge in the past, not least with his Starship rocket, the largest ever built which he hopes will one day fly people to Mars.
His latest venture could be developed by his newest company, xAI, which was founded last year with the lofty goal of ‘understanding the true nature of the universe’.
Its first product, Grok, was unveiled in November as a rival to ChatGPT and designed to ‘have a little more humour in its responses’.
Announcing Grok!
Grok is an AI modeled after the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, so intended to answer almost anything and, far harder, even suggest what questions to ask!
Grok is designed to answer questions with a bit of wit and has a rebellious streak, so please don’t use…
— xAI (@xai) November 5, 2023
Launching the chatbot, Mr Musk shared responses from it including a joke recipe for homemade cocaine and a very sarcastic take on the plight of FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried after he was found guilty of fraud.
If the company is now turning its attention to email, it may find the X name somewhat problematic. As a number have already pointed out, the letter X online is frequently associated with adult content, and so an @X.com address may trigger a spam filter or two.
However, XMail could also be a spin-off from X itself, with Mr Musk having been vocal about his aim to turn it into the ‘everything app’, but with little detail as to how this will be done.
