Are mailto links even relevant in an age of increased webmail?

Question

As the question states: Mailto is useful enough for people who use a desktop email client. That number is, I'm thinking, going down all the time outside of corporate intranets. Thus making mailto links an annoyance for these people, as they have to close whatever the default mail client is on their system and copy-paste the link.

Now, I know that there's plugins to bridge the issue, but let's face it - most people probably don't use them. Is using mailto rude or unthinking these days? I say yes, what say ye?

Answer 1

I'm not sure what's the problem? Use a mailto link for those who want it, and have the link text display the address. Those who use webmail (or want to copy it for whatever purprose) can then just highlight it and copy.

Answer 2

Gmail can be used to link mailto - so, webmail is not an issue, if it is well written ;)

Take a loot at this, for instance. And as said in another post, Google Toolbar offers this out of the box.

Answer 3

Its either close the default mail client or copy-and-paste the mailto address. What we really need is for OS vendors to make it so we can set up a webmail address as our default mail client. Though there are security issues to consider with that of course.

Answer 4

If you use the Google Toolbar, you can have mailto: links go to gmail.

So, no... mailto: links are still relevant.

Answer 5

Mailto links are still the standard way to do things. Your alternative is to just put the email on a page in plain text, which is strictly less usable, since now nobody can click on it.

If you really want to do something useful, you could use javascript to add a little drop down menu that appears on hover that has links to several popular webmail's "compose" options. However, I haven't seen that done anywhere and so might be awkward for users.

Answer 6

I personally think they're still relevant, since I still use a desktop email client. What alternatives to a mailto link exist? Printing the email address sans an actual <a> tag is annoying, because then visitors have to copy-paste the email address; and using a form to submit a message is annoying because then there's no record of a sent email.

If a visitor without a configured desktop email client is really concerned about mailto links, he can always install a plugin to handle mailto links with his webmail client.

Answer 7

It's a standard. Why throw away a standard just because some people don't use it? Browsers like Google Chrome have a "Copy E-mail Address" option on the right-click menu so people without a desktop client can easily get the address into their webmail application.

These days, I don't think people post their email addresses as text, anyway. Or they shouldn't, at least. It's way too easy for spam bots to grab them that way. I always try to place mine in an image or something.

The bottom line is, it's kind of a non-issue.

Answer 8

Browsers are building in support for webmail. I'm using Firefox 3.5 and it gives me a choice of Gmail, Yahoo mail, or "use other" (in addition to Thunderbird).

Answer 9

Mailto is relevant. As with all HTML, it's up to the client's web browser to interpret the meaning. Which implies that it is possible for a web browser to forward the request to a web mail solution.

It's unlikely for that work, as that most web mail services do not follow a standard way of doing things. However, there are a lot of mail clients that are used, and I find it nice to have a mailto link. Also, firefox allows for the user to copy just the email address.

Answer 10

Any additional semantic meaning you can add to content is a good thing. Mailto differentiates an email address where a user needs to take immediate action on, from a regular address that can wait to have action taken.

Answer 11

Mailto is a wonderful thing. I want your email address to open in my client, not a browser window.

Answer 12

I'll be the dissenting view here. Mailto links annoy the hell out of me when the email is not also printed on the webpage, or when it isn't clear that it is an email link. For example, a link marked "feedback" could just as well lead to a web form. I browse a lot on machines other than my own, and I don't appreciate having to wait ~10 seconds for Outlook to start up, just so I can click No a bunch of times, then go back to my browser.

So mailto links are fine, but please label them clearly.