Google to introduce subscription charges for Gmail

Google today announced new subscription pricing for their popular Gmail service, in the face of falling advertising revenues and a massive capital shortfall resulting from their investments in robotics, drones, and driverless cars.

According to Google, all existing Gmail accounts will be limited to 100MB of email data. Beyond this figure incoming emails will be returned with a "Mailbox full" message and users will not be able to create new messages or replies. Google spokesperson Randy Daily explained that "Google greatly regrets the need to introduce fees for our great email service, but we know our 800 million loyal users will understand that the profitability of Google is essential to the ongoing availability of Gmail."

To prevent users from exceeding their mailbox limit, there is a new option to delete emails from all areas including the Gmail archive when they are seven days old. This option will be enabled at the end of April for all users who have not subscribed to enough mailbox space.

New subscription plans start at US$50 per month for an additional 100MB of email data. Users will need to subscribe to retain all existing email data as well as new emails. The new plans are available from April 1st.

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