Posted by Bill Kee, Gmail Team

Do you have mad video-making skills? OK, how about just a video camera and a little bit of spare time to get creative? A few of us on the Gmail team came up with an idea to stitch together a bunch of video clips that all share one element: someone hands the Gmail M-velope in from the left of the screen, and hands it off to the right. Put them all together, and they form one long chain of hand-offs. We thought it would be fun to let everyone in on the action. Just go to http://mail.google.com/mvideo, where you'll find directions on how to submit your clip (including a PDF of the Gmail M-velope you can use in your video). We'll be accepting clips until August 13th. We'll then take a selection of the submitted clips and edit them together into one final video, which we'll release to the world on August 20th.

What does this have to do with email, you may ask? Well, you can see this as a symbol of how email connects people from all over, making the world feel a bit smaller. Or you could think of it as a metaphor for mail exchange servers, Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP), and all of the technical steps involved in getting a Gmail message around the world from one inbox to another. But, really, we just wanted to have a little fun. So give it a shot, and enjoy! Remember, clips are due before August 13th. :-)