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How Google Could Overthrow AIM
Posted by
CmdrTaco
on Mon Aug 23, 2004 04:10 PM
from the defacto-standards dept.
from the defacto-standards dept.
An anonymous reader writes "There's an interesting article over at Apple-X.net that speculates on the possibility of an instant-messaging service offered by Google that would be based on the open Jabber protocol. If Jabber was supported by a major company like Google, it could dominate over proprietary services such as AIM or MSN."
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Wha? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Wha? (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Wha? (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm just guessing, but Google would probably offer the ability to connect to the other four major services through their client, ala Kopete|Gaim|Trillian. I think the Jabber protocol supports this. And if they use Qt, they could simultaneously release Linux, win32 and OSX clients. (I know they could use Gtk, but why torture us?)
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Re:Wha? (Score:5, Funny)
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IM's (Score:5, Interesting)
ICQ can do offline messaging, which MSN can't without an annoying add-in installed.
ICQ can do SMS, so can MSN now, but with another add-in... this is all previously achieved technology.
I welcome the concept of Google making an Instant Messenger, please do! They'd probably do a better job at it without almost nightly downtimes of their servers.
Re:IM's (Score:5, Insightful)
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yes, but ICQ had a *HORIBLE INTERFACE* (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re:IM's (Score:5, Insightful)
I used ICQ for years but it always seemed clunky, and had a million features that were useless. ALso MSN was the first with a webcam feature that just worked behind firewalls, and little things like games that people liked to play.
ICQ lost because they were perpetually in beta and even with years head start never managed to make a good client.
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Re:IM's (Score:5, Interesting)
Here in the Netherlands there was a move to MSN. It is so bad around here the acronym "IM" isn't even used. People just refer to it as MSNing instead of IMing. I think ICQ still hase a very VERY small market share, along with Yahoo messenger. I think dutch people would rather be found dead then found with AIM installed, though.
Don't know why. I use MSN too, I like it's interface. Nice and clean with a little work, compared to either ICQ or Yahoo. Don't know about AIM, but I know 0 people who use AIM so I honestly couldn't care less. Granted, I mainly use MSN because most people I know use it and because it's available by default on every WinXP PC, not for the interface.
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Go Google. (Score:5, Informative)
Heh - same as always
I'd love to see Google get in with Jabber. Joogle? I use Jabber. But everyone I try to get on there simply says: But all my friends are on MSN. Some people have never ever heard of Yahoo, AIM, or the old classic, ICQ. Go Google, I say. Oh, and don't be evil. Although I'll be using SSL and GPG over Jabber, as usual.
Re:Go Google. (Score:5, Funny)
"I pity the fool who doesn't use Gibba Jabber!"
- bbk
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Wishful thinking (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Wishful thinking (Score:5, Funny)
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Advertising? (Score:5, Interesting)
How does this fit the Google company quest? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:How does this fit the Google company quest? (Score:5, Insightful)
With gmail, we can search all old emails with the same simple interface as searching the web. Now, add IM transcripts (great for business), PIM information, etc. Maybe someday, they'll aggregate even more personal stuff, like bank statements, my car's service history, and so on.
The end result? With the beautifully simple default google interface, I could ask:
Think of any piece of information you recently looked up or asked for, on computer or hardcopy. Imagine typing it into google and getting the answer.
It could be really cool, and kinda creepy. MS and Yahoo are at a disadvantage to pull this off because: they're behind the curve on search engine technology (look at MS's recently yanked beta), they'll never take the leap of faith to give users an incredibly stripped, ad-free interface (I know yahoo offers one, but they deemphasize it), and not nearly as many people will trust them with this stuff as would trust google.
IM makes a nice next step.
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sounds like... (Score:5, Funny)
one engine to find them,
One engine to return them all
and to the results bind them.
IM has never been about software or protocals, (Score:5, Insightful)
It also seems a bit silly for Google to be interested in IM. Google's services always revolve around searching (even gmail), something that isn't very useful for IM. They could perhaps make finding buddies or finding past conversations easier, but other than that, I fail to see where google could work their magic.
Why Google and why Instant Messaging? (Score:5, Insightful)
If so, there is nothing particularly interesting about this. Sure, any piece of software that gets a direct link from the Google front page is going to have a massive advantage over its competitors, and yes, were that to happen, it would be nice if that software happened to use an open protocol with lots of open source clients.
The fact that he chose instant messaging as the application, and Google as the big powerful company with all the eyeballs is somewhat irrelevant, the same would be true of almost any application and almost any company with a massively popular website.
Of course, if the big powerful company just happens to be Google, the darling of Slashdot editors, then it certainly won't hurt his advertising click-through revenue :-)
Searchable IMs? (Score:5, Interesting)
This won't happen any time soon (Score:5, Insightful)
They are too busy with their current projects. Gmail has been in beta for almost half a year and it still isn't final. And still as a beta project, they made yahoo and msn catch up to provide more space.
I wonder how google IM would shape up aim, yahoo, msn and icq.
Jabber great because of encryption (Score:5, Insightful)
The reason Jabber is so great is because of its encryption support. I can load up gabber and use SSL (and end-to-end GPG encryption within *that*).
If Google gives me end-to-end encryption, Google will win me and everyone I can convince over. Everything else is irrelevant. The current state of IM security is abysmal.
That means that there will be a single party that can monitor who communicates with who (not ideal, but not that far from the existing cell phone situation), but not the *content*.
Have we found the missing step 2? (Score:5, Funny)
2. Attach Google's name to it.
3. Profit!!!
Here are a few:
If Google made a MMORPG it would rule the earth!
If Google made a Linux distribution with Spotlight-like search, it would rule the earth!
If Google let me host all my MP3's it would rule the earth!
Seriously though, it might be interesting to have all of my IM history searchable, but I mostly use it for one-off conversations about things of limited importance.
Besides, as general benevolent as Google seems to be, do we really want to route sensitive messages through a central place? Especially with the recent Slashdot articles about VOIP being required to support wire taps. [slashdot.org] Do we want adwords showing up keyed off of our IM conversations? How could we secure such a system?
Posters without vision.. (Score:5, Insightful)
What little vision!
First and foremost, searching archives of IM's sucks on almost every windows client there is. GAIM, Miranda, Trillian, AIM, MSN-IM, etc etc. Thats a niche waiting for them - they are the kings of search.
Second, for Google to be universal, they need contact management soon. They need to know WHO someone is. Orkut is a step there. Gmail's contact manager *sucks*.
Combine the two, AND an instant messenger that interoperates between all the networks ALA GAIM, and you suddenly have a complete profile, 6+ potential screennames, possibly a website, their gmail address, and voila - you have a strong awareness of who the user is.
NOW use THAT to improve search results - google for pages that Linus Torvalds wrote. Now google knows what his IM names are, what his webpage is, what his gmail address is, and can specify ALL of those pages containing those items as "better hits" than just any webpage. It can even do it transparently (hidden) for better security.
Taking it a step further, you now have the makings of a web-based contact management system - email, IM, blogs, profiles, images, all from their various packages.
Sounds visionary to me!
Some problems... (Score:5, Insightful)
If people were freaking out about context-sensitive text ads in their email, just imagine the reaction to the plan to "scan" IM messages for advertising.
Open standards and instant messaging (Score:5, Insightful)
There's something to be said for changing the protocol and client at your whim to add fun and interesting modes of communication.
Not a good Idea (Score:5, Funny)
Chat Session Google Ads
A> Hello. Buy greeting cards!
B> How much of Have us do your
your homework homework for $5!!!
Have you done?
...
Re:Don't think so (Score:5, Interesting)
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on the other hand... (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Don't think so (Score:5, Interesting)
It's not the same thing at all. E-mail is all interoperable. Different mail services are like different IM clients, not like different IM networks. Being one of the few users of an email provider has a certain appeal to most people. However, with an IM service, it's useless unless other people are using it too.
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Re:Don't think so (Score:5, Insightful)
On the other hand, dropping Hotmail just involves telling everyone your new email address. Not necessarily a trivial task, but they can still talk to you.
If people are to change to another IM protocol, it will very possibly have to be able to talk to AIM at least to start. Otherwise it'll be difficult to get the critical mass of people to transfer.
In short:
Change of email is a personal decision; you don't need to force others to change with you.
Change of IM is the opposite; for the most part, for other people to talk to you, they need to change too.
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Re:why? (Score:5, Insightful)
If it works in GMail, expect to see GIM.
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Re:why? (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:why? (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:why? (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:why? (Score:5, Insightful)
For one, you can write your own client to work with the service(s). Secondly, the service(s) are not dependant on a specific client so the IM network as a whole is substantially more secure.
I love jabber. Checkout Coccinella [fyristorg.com].
There are multitudes of other clients available, widely, for just about any platform you can think of.
Just like other open source projects, open source IM protocol(s) bring 'choice' back into the users hands. Sure, you can download Trillian or whatever and get on multiple IM services - but it's messy and the proprietary protocols (particularly Yahoo) are constantly being changed to prevent other messenger apps from working on their networks.
Just love it. Man, hope Google does do this. *Laughs* Like I needed another reason to love Google.
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Re:why? (Score:5, Interesting)
Another post talked about the "good old days" before IM fragmentation when everyone just used ICQ. In my view, the golden opportunity for everyone else to get market share was when Mirabilis failed to update ICQ so that it would work through corporate firewalls. Before long, all the kids who were crazy about IM in college graduated, found out they couldn't run ICQ through their company's corporate firewall, and moved en mass to other networks like Yahoo that had workarounds. By the time ICQ caught up, it was too late, people had already switched.
If Google is going to get their IM network to take off, it's going to take something about existing IM networks that can similarly simultaneously annoy you and all your friends into switching. I'm not sure what it's going to be, but it'll probably have to be something stronger than the lure of having everyone code their own client.
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Re:why? (Score:5, Interesting)
I do. Or more correctly, the company I work for runs the IM client that I wrote. Why? Because we wanted to add web accessibility to our IM system, and it was nearly trivial to throw that onto our Zope server. What's the going rate for integrating MSN or Yahoo! onto a pre-existing Unix web server these days?
Yeah, I realize that this is a very atypical situation, but just because you don't know someone who's written their own client doesn't mean that noone has. There are a lot of niches where Jabber scales down brilliantly, but where the old, closed systems don't seem to scale down at all.
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Re:why? (Score:5, Funny)
Thank you,
Management
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Re:why? (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:why? (Score:5, Insightful)
The only possible issue is that the logs and message transmissions would have to go through Google's servers. Personally, I don't mind that. At least I'd know that ALL settings and history are saved between machines instead of the classic issue of SOMETHING being lost when I jump from machine to machine. Not to mention that it would be the ultimate in cross-platform compatibility.
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Re:Subscribers and Dating (Score:5, Funny)
Say, wasn't this on Seinfeld?
BTM
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Re:Subscribers and Dating (Score:5, Funny)
Please, we both know if a your main concern about meeting a significant other is which IM service they use, that both of you are using AOL.
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Re:ICQ (Score:5, Funny)
57007188888
How about yours?
16085588888
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Re:ICQ (Score:5, Funny)
57007188888
How about yours?
16085588888
Funny, you don't look Jewish.
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Re:ICQ (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re:ICQ (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:ICQ (Score:5, Insightful)
I was a fan of ICQ up until v2000. It had a lot more useful features, and a History mechanism that couldn't be beat. Then, they dropped the good logging mechanism and started adding a whole bunch of useless "search bar" type of garbage that just slowed the program up.
Luckily, that's when Trillian started to hit the scene. The funny thing is, I have Trillian Pro, and it's loaded up with plugins like an RSS reader and all kinds of search crap... but it's less intrusive and more integrated, and I find it to be a benefit.
Hopefully now, if Google IM takes off, Trillian will start supporting Jabber natively (instead of via a plugin).
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Re:ICQ (Score:5, Funny)
It's okay you don't need to post anonymously, I really won't look down my nose at you and your high
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Re:ICQ (Score:5, Funny)
Kids these days...
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