can other company develop webmail system like Gmail?

[xiongsb]

Gmail organize all replies of one mail in a "conversation", this feature is great if a lot of mail is sent or received, is it possible that other company develop a mail system like this? 2 questions:

1. Did Google registered any patent for this feature? I don't know which keyword should be searched.

2. How to implement this feature? Any expert know?

Sorry if this has been discussed before, I tried to search the forum but get a lot of results and can't read all.

[kcmandava]

Gmail organize all replies of one mail in a "conversation", this feature is great if a lot of mail is sent or received, is it possible that other company develop a mail system like this? 2 questions:

1. Did Google registered any patent for this feature? I don't know which keyword should be searched.

2. How to implement this feature? Any expert know?

Sorry if this has been discussed before, I tried to search the forum but get a lot of results and can't read all.

There is a possibility that this feature has been patented. Its not clear whether this is the case because Gmail is still in beta. I don't think this feature has been discussed on Google Community before. I hope somebody will be able to help you out.

[Prathab]

well..
i think,
for the moment, there is none other than gmail has this feature...

[Schentler]

Yes ... other people can, it has not been patient however, pagerank is patiented :P but not to Google .. pagerank was patiented to their former name and the university of stanford.

[xiongsb]

Thanks, seems that pagerank is not needed for this mail system? and, anybody know how to implement the mail system?