Google’s GMail may just be about ready to leave beta. No, really. It seems that instead of the typical 5 or, some people have claimed 10 gmail invites they have in their queues, today most gmailers woke to find a stack of 50 gmail invites.

One of the most obvious reasons would be be that Google is ready to rapidly increase the ammount of people in the system on a scale never before seen and go from beta to full production. The invitation-only system has been a smart way to foster an elitist, geek-sheik community around gmail membership. The bright and shiny luster of a gmail account has waned a bit over the last year or so. The first invites were snatched up and some sold on ebay for primiums. This is no longer the case. Most of the name squatting has already happend, while there are several unque email addresses available, the good, short ones are most certainly all gone.

So, what am I to do with 50 gmail invites? Who knows. I have already contacted all my firends that wanted one long ago. I’ve given several to isnoop.net’s GMail invite spooler which at the time, was starving for invites. As soon as one appeared in their queue, it was gone. They had distributed over 200 thousand invitations with said invites going as quickly as they came in. It was like watching an endless line of people at one of thoes sample tables at grocery markets on Saturday morning – everybody wants it, it’s free, the line moves quickly…

As I write this, isnoop.net’s GMail invite spooler has 46,153 invites in it’s queue! Apparently I’m not the only one that is wondering what to do with their invites. With the glut of invitations now at the GMail sample table, is it too late for the geek-shiek-wannabe-come-lately? The coolness has certain been dimmed a bit but it’s still there. You just have to have to look way back in time – like what we to do when we see the light from distant stars. It’s taken millions of lightyears to get here from there.

You got yours way back in the past, at the edge of the Google universe, right? If not, that’s cool. I know where you can get a whole bunch!