Our resident SEO girl has had the same hotmail.com password since the beginning of time (i.e. when she first went online in about 1997) Pretty much everyone in our office started their online life with a hotmail.com account!

But our buddies over at Microsoft have decided to abandon our favourite free webmail brand in favour of Outlook.com- the humanity! The idea is to revamp the service to incorporate Skype and help us declutter our inboxes (which frankly feels like when our mothers leave clothes organisers in our bedrooms ‘to help’ – hey, mum, if I want to organise my dirty and clean clothing by crispiness, I will!)

The BBC reported that a huge part of the move is to launch an attack on rival Gmail.com, which is currently more popular with free webmail users. The idea is to win over Gmail.com users with a sleek new-but-familiar service. The revamped service will connect to Twitter , LinkedIn, Facebook, Google and Skype.

Their new promotional garb is full of the usual ‘user experience greatly enhanced by a feed of friend and family photo straight from their smartphones blah blah blah’ but we reckon it’ll be like all new software and technology – old Kindle to iPod, old iPad to Canon 350D camera – it will be what you make of it, and with enough effort you can make a mess of anything!

But if you’re not up for the move just yet, Microsoft say hotmail.com users can stick with the original system… for now *ominous music* Those who make the move can keep their @hotmail, @msn or @live.com email address endings, but can also add @outlook.com.

Want a shiny new device to browse the new Microsoft system on? Why not sell laptops and whatever else you’ve got lying around to fund an upgrade? Our sell for cash UK rates are really quite splendid!