Ping Wants to Turn Email Around - Makes email about the conversation, not the list
There have been a lot of apps lately that want to make email new again. Most of them just use the same old paradigms to view your email with folders and lists. But Ping seems email a bit differently. And it's trying make the process email more efficient.
The big idea behind Ping is that email should be a conversation, not a long novel of some kind. Ping takes email and makes it much more like a conversation by converting inboxes into more of an instant messaging client than a typical email client. Instead of lists of individual messages, all messages from a particular person are listed in a conversation. Those conversations can be replied to, just like an email. And if the other user is using normal email, it will look just like that to them. If the other person happens to be using Ping as well, then true instant mode starts and direct communication starts with the other person, no email needed.
Bulk messages and newsletters are handled the same way, but separated into their own view. So readers will only see one thread that lists all of the messages from any particular source like daily emails or special offers.
The end effect of turning email around from conversations on a topic to conversations with a person is efficiency. You can quickly respond to the messages with much less clutter than a traditional email box.
Ping represents a real change in email and how we use it. The first version is good and I can't wait to see what comes in future versions. Sign up for early access to ping at http://pingapp.com/ before it is released on September 18th.