I Miss U

This past Monday, Google released its newest feature from Gmail Labs. “Mail Goggles” is an opt-in service that has five simple math problems at the bottom of every e-mail you send on a Friday and Saturday night. You have 60 seconds to enter the right answers and if you mess up or run out of time, your e-mail won’t send and waits for you to be in a more, well, sober mindset.

According to the official Gmail Blog, Mail Goggles was developed to prevent Gmail users from sending e-mails they might later wish they didn’t. “Sometimes I send messages I shouldn’t send. Like the time I told that girl I had a crush on her over text message…When you enable Mail Goggles, it will check that you’re really sure you want to send that late night Friday e-mail.” A message comes up saying, “It’s that time of day. Gmail aims to help you in many ways. Are you sure you want to send this? Answer some simple math problems to verify,” followed by problems like “69-38” and “37+19.”

This is just one feature in the grand scheme of improvements to Gmail. Features like “Forgotten Attachment Detector” and “Pictures in Chat” are also part of the improvement plan and users are encouraged to provide feedback.

Though we’re not sure what is going to stop us from just grabbing a calculator, we are wondering if some math problems (and maybe some vocabulary questions, too) at the end of every e-mail sent by a student would help keep their skills just a bit sharper.

Mail Goggles is getting mixed feedback. What do you think about the newest, drunk-proof Gmail feature? [Forbes]