"Was" is the correct word to use. Here's a fun example: try explaining to someone non-technical why you can't simply download your e-mails. I went through that exercise this morning, when my wife asked me to download a bunch of e-mails and send them to her in a "folder", which she can then send to someone else.

So then I had to explain that GMail allows me to download a single message -- no bulk downloads, of course -- but it saves it in .eml format, which you can't open with programs that come installed on a typical Windows box. And even if you could, there's no guarantee that the guy you're sending them to can.

Of course, she thought that was stupid: why offer saving e-mails in an "obscure" format? So I had to explain why the Internet is now a bunch of walled gardens and closed services, all built on top of open and standardized protocols and formats. And, of course, those open standards can't improve and evolve easily, because each player in the game wants to lock users and their data inside their own walled garden.

So yeah, the takeaway in a nutshell is that the Internet was once open, but then it became lucrative.

EDIT: I think a lot of people replying here might be missing the point. Like I stated above, I was trying to explain the situation to a non-technical person. Yes, I'm aware of POP and IMAP support. Yes, I know RFC5322 is not an obscure format. But I'm talking about people who don't know or care what these things are. Try downloading a bunch of messages in RFC5322 format, zipping them and sending them to your average lawyer and see how they react.