Today I discovered how much gmail changes the point of view of the newsletters you recieve. Not that this is very important for me, as I almost always check newsletter text only. But when you go on the other side of the problem things changes:
Gmail don’t let to see background images, don’t support margins, paddings, etc.
Yes it is true tha usually you have a link on top of the email that says “if you can’t see this email correctly click here”, but how many people those effectively click there? So what we should do, return to the old html tables? I think it should be the user that decideds what he can or can’t see.
And gmail is not alone. Also many others do that. you can check an overview of browsers and features that are not supported at http://www.email-standards.org .
Here are a couple of link where you can find some useful information on how to overcome the problem or at least be aware of it: the usual ‘A list apart’ ( http://www.alistapart.com/articles/cssemail/ ) and another link that seems more practical also if the first point is to use html tables … ( http://www.vdotmedia.com/blog/9-best-practices-for-email-design/ )
It is a pity that mail designer looses hours of theirs short life and then some email clients don’t even see it.
But thats life we are always conditioned by stuff out there that we don’t even notice.