I just installed Top Dog but nothing has happened.
After installing Top Dog you should hit the "Send/Receive" or "Get Mail" button on your email reader.
If Top Dog is intercepting email, you should receive a welcome email from Top Dog.
If you do not receive a welcome email either you do not have a POP account or you have not restarted your email reader.

If you are not sure if you have a POP account check the accounts settings of your email reader.
If you are using Outlook more information can be found here.
Another possibility is that you are using a web based email account. If you read your email using Internet Explorer only then you have a web based email account. Top Dog does not work with web based email accounts except Hotmail and msn.

If you are sure you have a POP account then you haven't restarted your email reader.
If you are using Outlook then you have to choose "Exit and Log Off" from the "File" menu to actually close Outlook.
If this doesn't work restarting your computer will restart your email reader with certainty.


Why does Top Dog need to process outgoing mail?
Top Dog processes outgoing mail for main two reasons.
First to remove Top Dog's analysis when replying to an email.
Second to whitelist people and mailing lists you send mail to. This ensures that Top Dog will not mistake mail from these sources as spam regardless of how spammy it may look.

Is the speed at which one receives an email slowed?
Yes. Top Dog needs a little time to process incoming email.
However, Top Dog currently takes an average of about three seconds to process a message while in Lite mode.
It is highly unlikely that you will notice any time lag even with a large number of custom rules defined.