Primotech writes "Betanews has word that Microsoft and Yahoo plan to link their respective IM clients again so that users of both can communicate with each other on one, shared network. Facing threats from third-party applications, like Trillian and Skype, the two tech giants will claim 44% of the instant messaging market, analysts predict. They will also go head to head together with the biggest competitor, AOL." Yahoo and Microsoft to Merge Instant Messengers Log in/Create an Account | Top | 401 comments (Spill at 50!) | Index Only | Search Discussion Display Options Threshold: -1: 401 comments 0: 387 comments 1: 313 comments 2: 200 comments 3: 65 comments 4: 42 comments 5: 32 comments Flat Nested No Comments Threaded Oldest First Newest First Highest Scores First Oldest First (Ignore Threads) Newest First (Ignore Threads) The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way. I find that amusing... (Score:4, Interesting) by neiffer (698776) on Wednesday October 12, @12:10AM (#13770990) (http://www.google.com/) That's interesting, since they have waffled back and forth on the issue of compatibility with other messenger systems. First they complained because they didn't have access to AOL. Then they closed their systems and didn't let others in. Now they are sharing again...does this mean they will grant access to their closed network to all outside clients? Hmmmmmm? [ Reply to ThisRe:I find that amusing... by PsychicX (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @12:14AM Re:I find that amusing... (Score:4, Funny) by millette (56354) <millette@ w a g l o.com> on Wednesday October 12, @01:01AM (#13771209) (http://rym.waglo.com/ | Last Journal: Monday May 10, @01:11PM) But Gaim's source is already open !Oh, wait, I see what you mean ;) [ Reply to This | Parent1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:I find that amusing... by bergeron76 (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @12:23AMRe:I find that amusing... by zev1983 (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @01:22AMRe:I find that amusing... by Skreems (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @02:26AMRe:I find that amusing... by carl0ski (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @03:03AMRe:I find that amusing... by LordSnooty (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @04:19AMRe:I find that amusing... by Skreems (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @04:39PM1 reply beneath your current threshold. Re:I find that amusing... (Score:4, Insightful) by Baricom (763970) on Wednesday October 12, @01:24AM (#13771298) -1 The End of Yahoo as we Know ItI happen to think that Yahoo! is doing some amazing, cool stuff - cool enough to be a major Google competitor. I like it that way, because in my opinion, neither company has a definitive edge, and they keep trying to out-innovate each other because of it. That's an incredibly good thing.Yahoo! was the first Google - the site that strived to sort the web so mere mortals could get around. I first used it when it was http://akebono.stanford.edu/ [stanford.edu]. The day it gets bought by Microsoft will be a sad day, indeed. [ Reply to This | Parent1 reply beneath your current threshold.1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:I find that amusing... by earnest murderer (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @01:14AMRe:I find that amusing... by Fuzzle (Score:3) Wednesday October 12, @02:49AM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:I find that amusing... by umeshunni (Score:3) Wednesday October 12, @01:32AM Re:I find that amusing... (Score:5, Informative) by Jaruzel (804522) on Wednesday October 12, @05:12AM (#13771865) (http://www.mattowen.com/) Yes, but Live Communicator isn't a consumer product, it's specifically designed for Corporates, where the problem of interoperability is a BIG issue.Live Communicator (the IM client) needs Live Communicator Server, plus Active Directory, with either Exchange, or a Schema change to the AD.Live Communicator Server is the gateway to the external IM networks - the client has no ability to connect to Yahoo!/AIM/ICQ directly.It's a huge undertaking for a Corporate to install it, and most Corporates are wary of IM in the first instance, and feel the benefits are not yet clear (I don't agree with this, being a Business Chat/IM evangelist).Sorry, to waffle on, but just wanted to nip the 'Live Communicator does this already' argument in the bud.-Jar. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:I find that amusing... by Gunny101 (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @10:03AM1 reply beneath your current threshold. Amazing (Score:4, Interesting) by dxprog (898953) on Wednesday October 12, @12:10AM (#13770993) Could this be a step towards a single IM protocol? Not XMPP, but good enough for me :-) [ Reply to ThisRe:Amazing by Saeed al-Sahaf (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @01:08AMRe:Amazing by lightspawn (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @01:17AMRe:Amazing by BrainInAJar (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @02:34AMRe:Amazing by kahanamoku (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @01:42AMGIMP by Kadin2048 (Score:3) Wednesday October 12, @11:37AMRe:GIMP by kahanamoku (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @05:32PMRe:GIMP by kahanamoku (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @05:35PMDistributed IM with open specs? by fernique (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @04:46AMRe:Distributed IM with open specs? by jacksonj04 (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @05:15AMOpen protocols by gilesjuk (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @07:07AMRe:Open protocols by mforbes (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @08:33AMRe:Open protocols by billcopc (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @12:58PMRe:Open protocols by Chris Mattern (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @03:23PMRe:Amazing by jez9999 (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @10:11AMRe:Amazing by billcopc (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @01:04PMRe:Amazing by kurtmckee (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @10:29AMUnified protocol doesn't mean unified networks by Geoff-with-a-G (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @11:18AM One Word Gaim (Score:5, Informative) by SerpentDrago (703376) * on Wednesday October 12, @12:10AM (#13770997) I could care less , whatever network things use , its all Transparent to me cause i use Gaim [ Reply to This Coming soon to Gaim (Score:5, Informative) by tqft (619476) <<moc.oohay> <ta> <ua_sworrubnai>> on Wednesday October 12, @12:14AM (#13771017) (http://tqft.blogspot.com/ | Last Journal: Saturday April 09, @02:28AM) http://gaim-vv.sourceforge.net/ [sourceforge.net]LATEST NEWS:Oct 07, 2005 - Forward potr of gaim-vv 1.2.0 to gaim cvs head is working. I would like to clarify that gaim-vv isn't completely dead, we're working on merging with gaim. There will be no further gaim-vv releases, as code will be added to the main gaim program.For those who don't know gaim-vv was a friendly fork to get stuff like webcams working - last release allowed users to view webcams from MSN, yahoo [ Reply to This | ParentWebcams in Jabber? by fernique (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @05:10AMRe:Coming soon to Gaim by larry bagina (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @02:00AM Re:Coming soon to Gaim (Score:4, Insightful) by ilyaaohell (866922) on Wednesday October 12, @02:34AM (#13771480) "You" meaning the "user", or "you" meaning "him" specifically? I'm personally a "user", not a programmer, and I have no ability to contribute to Open Source software. However, when Open Source software is advertised to the masses the way GAIM is, I would like to use it. Just because it's open source, does that mean I waive any right to complain about lack of features or to request features for someone else to include? Are there no users of open source software and only developers?GAIM has a ton of features (more than the official clients), but it lacks some of those features which many of us find necessary or, at the very least, useful. Webcam support is one of them. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Coming soon to Gaim by Lucractius (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @03:35AMRe:Coming soon to Gaim by Mongr (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @10:24AM Re:Coming soon to Gaim (Score:5, Informative) by X0563511 (793323) * <x0563511@gmail.com> on Wednesday October 12, @10:59AM (#13773428) (http://x0563511.dyndns.org/) Or you could just set it to ignore all incoming formatting, and send your's without any included. You see what they type, they see what you type, no BS (im thinking dark brown on black - i have a dumbass friend who sends that)Smilies go out the window as well. Useless. [ Reply to This | Parent1 reply beneath your current threshold. Re:Coming soon to Gaim (Score:5, Informative) by jrumney (197329) on Wednesday October 12, @05:41AM (#13771904) (http://jasonrumney.net/) Just because it's open source, does that mean I waive any right to complain about lack of features or to request features for someone else to include?As a developer of open source software, I welcome requests for features, but complaining about a missing feature which you were never promised, in software which you haven't paid a cent for nor contributed your own effort to, is not going to get you far. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Coming soon to Gaim by megarich (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @12:41PMRe:Coming soon to Gaim by fupeg (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @01:57PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:Coming soon to Gaim by someonewhois (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @03:24PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:Coming soon to Gaim by FooBarWidget (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @10:44AMRe:Coming soon to Gaim by ilyaaohell (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @02:07PMRe:Coming soon to Gaim by Slime-dogg (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @11:52AM1 reply beneath your current threshold. Re:One Word Gaim (Score:5, Insightful) by Seumas (6865) on Wednesday October 12, @12:29AM (#13771084) its all Transparent to me cause i use GaimBut, it's not.Going to Yahoo!, creating an account, dealing with their spam emails and offers all the time in the future and then logging into Yahoo! with that special Yahoo! account is not transparent whatsoever. And not enough people use Yahoo! to justify creating a special account just to talk to them.Yahoo! probably realized this and gave up the ship. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:One Word Gaim by Michael Wardle (Score:3) Wednesday October 12, @01:39AMRe:One Word Gaim by DavidD_CA (Score:3) Wednesday October 12, @01:53AM You'd be surprised (Score:5, Interesting) by Trejkaz (615352) on Wednesday October 12, @02:16AM (#13771436) (http://trypticon.org/) Recent usage statistics actually look a bit like this:AOL (sum of ICQ, AIM and AOLIM) = 41.6 millionYahoo = 19.1 millionMSN = 14.1 millionOf course, there is also Jabber which was 10 million at last count which was a couple of years ago but more than likely growing. There is also QQ messenger, which supposedly has over 100 million users, but every news story like this conveniently ignores. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:You'd be surprised by notthe9 (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @09:22AMRe:You'd be surprised by Trejkaz (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @08:50PMMSN more popular in the UK by astralbat (Score:3) Wednesday October 12, @10:02AMRe:MSN more popular in the UK by Jesus_666 (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @03:24PMRe:MSN more popular in the UK by Trejkaz (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @08:47PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:You'd be surprised by fbroooooz (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @10:34AMRe:You'd be surprised by larz (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @10:54AMRe:You'd be surprised by Trejkaz (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @08:43PMRe:You'd be surprised by AttillaTheNun (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @07:07PMRe:You'd be surprised by Trejkaz (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @08:37PMRe:One Word Gaim by timmarhy (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @03:51AM2 replies beneath your current threshold.Re:One Word Gaim by Saeed al-Sahaf (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @01:11AMRe:One Word Gaim by Frogbert (Score:3) Wednesday October 12, @01:39AMCrypt Keeping by Mateo_LeFou (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @10:06AM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:One Word Gaim by Doppler00 (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @02:27AMRe:One Word Gaim by kyhwana (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @08:42AMRe:One Word Gaim by CProgrammer98 (Score:3) Wednesday October 12, @03:16AMRe:One Word Gaim by stevencbrown (Score:3) Wednesday October 12, @03:28AM Re:One Word Gaim (Score:5, Informative) by lav-chan (815252) on Wednesday October 12, @03:47AM (#13771657) The phrase supposedly started in America a few decades ago, but it's spread to the rest of the world by now. The etymology isn't entirely clear (some people think it could've been intended to be sarcastic, or that it was misread in print), but it's probably the simplest one -- it's the same reason people say 'case and point' and 'for all intensive purposes' and 'supposively'. People say it so often that eventually some of them become ignorant of the actual meaning and just repeat it however.I don't think most people actually intend to say it incorrectly but, in my experience, they also refuse to change when they are told that it's wrong. I guess they just... couldn't... care less.... [ Reply to This | ParentRe:One Word Gaim by kniLnamiJ-neB (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @09:05AMRe:One Word Gaim by GungaDan (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @10:05AMRe:One Word Gaim by kniLnamiJ-neB (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @09:20AM3 replies beneath your current threshold.Idiots. by Kadin2048 (Score:3) Wednesday October 12, @11:43AMRe:One Word Gaim by Slime-dogg (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @12:04PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:One Word Gaim by Fallus Shempus (Score:3) Wednesday October 12, @07:55AMRe:One Word Gaim by nytmare (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @01:36PMRe:One Word Gaim by drsquare (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @03:33AM Re:One Word Gaim (Score:4, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 12, @03:48AM (#13771663) you couldn't care lessCOULDN'T CARE LESSGodamn it. I hope you fall down some stairs. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:One Word Gaim by TheoGB (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @04:39AMRe:One Word Gaim by -brazil- (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @06:00AMRe:One Word Gaim by MTO_B. (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @06:07AMRe:One Word Gaim by syrinx (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @02:24PMRe:One Word Gaim by djp928 (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @03:54PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.AIM by Anonymous Coward (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @12:11AMRe:AIM by Tolkien (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @12:49AMRe:AIM by MateusB (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @12:54AM1 reply beneath your current threshold. Trillian? (Score:5, Insightful) by USSJoin (896766) on Wednesday October 12, @12:12AM (#13771006) Trillian isn't its own protocol, of course. This is what is somewhat odd about the article: it can't decide whether it's talking about the networks (MSN and YIM combining protocols and having interoperability) or whether they're jointly developing a multi-protocol client (like Trillian, although Trillian does a lot more than just those two). [ Reply to ThisRe:Trillian? by Penguin Programmer (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @12:38AM Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. (Score:5, Interesting) by Baloo Ursidae (29355) <baloo@ursine.ca> on Wednesday October 12, @01:26AM (#13771302) (http://ursine.ca/User:BalooUrsidae | Last Journal: Wednesday May 11, @08:37PM) MSN, Yahoo, ICQ and AIM buddiesDisclaimer: I run the ursine.ca Jabber server.The yahoo transport sucks donkeyballs. It's unreliable and crashes for no reason, usually while I'm trying to get other work done. As evil as Microsoft typically is, they're doing us a favor: Now Jabber only has to maintain two or three transports and none of them involving some bletcherous hack from jabberd's transports if you're using the otherwise far easier to deal with ejabberd. Microsoft has to have their way, so you can pretty much kiss the YIM protocol good bye and everybody with a YIM ID suddenly having @yahoo.com Passports instead, and good riddance. Now there's only two proprietary protocols left: Oscar (AIM/ICQ) and MSN.The 80 gajillion Google fanboys are suddenly able to access the rest of the IM landscape that isn't stuck in the last millennium with their Google Talk JID. Google users and the rest of the Jabber network rejoice, AOL shits itself seeing headlights coming from both directions.Microsoft and Time Warner are going to strike a deal that will be kind of like AOL announcing that October 1993 would effectively follow January 2005 [ursine.ca] on the Usenet [ursine.ca] calendar. Except instead of AOL continuing to exist, Time Warner flushes AOL like an unwanted fetus on prom night, selling it out to Microsoft. Microsoft has to have their way, so you can pretty much kiss the Oscar protocol goodbye. Everybody with AIM IDs suddenly get @aim.com passports. Everybody at ICQ gets @icq.com passports.And then there was one. MSN Messenger fights to the bitter death, losing mindshare bit by bit until 10 years from now, Microsoft's holding an empty bag and wondering how the hell they missed the boat on IM. Everybody loves Google, and many will switch to Google Talk on basis of name recognition alone. Thank God that they don't abuse that power.(And in other news, the Portland Winterhawks probably won't make the playoffs this year. Again. Dammit.) [ Reply to This | Parent Re:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. (Score:4, Insightful) by toddhunter (659837) on Wednesday October 12, @01:54AM (#13771377) Thank God that they don't abuse that power.Oh ye of too much faith. Google is a company. Wait till their share price starts dropping and then we'll see if we thank them for not abusing their power. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by shish (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @10:01AMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by Geoff-with-a-G (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @11:06AMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by crowdofone (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @12:30PMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by Darkman, Walkin Dude (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @04:48AMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by aonaran (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @10:40AMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by Darkman, Walkin Dude (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @04:23PMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by aonaran (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @04:33PMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by Darkman, Walkin Dude (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @04:42PMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by Baloo Ursidae (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @10:49AMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by Darkman, Walkin Dude (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @04:26PMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by mysticalreaper (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @02:56PMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by Darkman, Walkin Dude (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @04:30PMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by Darkman, Walkin Dude (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @06:07AMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by Kethinov (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @03:29PMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by Darkman, Walkin Dude (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @04:35PMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by Kethinov (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @07:47PMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by Darkman, Walkin Dude (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @11:33PM2 replies beneath your current threshold.Re:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by digitalsurgeon (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @05:21AMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by Baloo Ursidae (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @01:32PMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by japhmi (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @01:50PMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by Baloo Ursidae (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @03:30PMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by digitalsurgeon (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @01:53PMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by Jesus_666 (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @03:46PMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by TheRaven64 (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @05:58AMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by Baloo Ursidae (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @10:46AMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by TheRaven64 (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @11:11AMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by Baloo Ursidae (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @01:01PMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by mdwh2 (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @10:14AMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by Baloo Ursidae (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @10:53AMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by mdwh2 (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @05:50PMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by mrchaotica (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @10:48AMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by Baloo Ursidae (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @03:27PMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by mrchaotica (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @03:54PMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by Baloo Ursidae (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @10:03PMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by mrchaotica (Score:2) Thursday October 13, @12:11AMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by jschoenberg (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @12:32PMRe:Trillian is irrelevant. Jabber is the future. by Baloo Ursidae (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @02:43PM2 replies beneath your current threshold.Re:Trillian? by databyss (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @09:02AMRe:Trillian? by mdwh2 (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @10:17AM Re:Trillian? (Score:5, Informative) by urlgrey (798089) * on Wednesday October 12, @01:21AM (#13771280) (http://www.ebiinc.com/) Ya know... I used to use the MSN Messenger client exclusively, then because of a need to communicate with one person who used Yahoo!, I tried Trillian. HOLY HECK. With the choice of skins and what not, what a relief. For me the MSN interface has just become this weirdly bloated thing. Trillian though... what a great piece of software IMHO. And best of all (unlike Messenger), it doesn't create those competely bogus hooks into OE that prevent you from closing the app because it's dependent on the other. Bah. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Trillian? by lustforlike (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @03:58AMRe:Trillian? by jp10558 (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @10:07AM Re:Trillian? (Score:5, Insightful) by labratuk (204918) on Wednesday October 12, @10:12AM (#13772913) With the choice of skins and what not, what a relief. For me the MSN interface has just become this weirdly bloated thing.This line is full of hilarious irony. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Trillian? by Jesus_666 (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @03:52PMRe:Trillian? by KylePflug (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @02:42AMRe:Trillian? by bedroll (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @09:30AM1 reply beneath your current threshold.1 reply beneath your current threshold. Common enemy (Score:5, Insightful) by gmuslera (3436) <gmuslera@gma[ ]com ['il.' in gap]> on Wednesday October 12, @12:12AM (#13771008) (Last Journal: Wednesday April 13, @12:12AM) More than Trillian, Skype and others, i bet that they are more against their common foe, Google/Gmail/GTalk/etc. Maybe against each separate component they can have a chance, but when you start to combine them the potential for growing and taking away their markets is probably too big. [ Reply to ThisRe:Common enemy by thedustbustr (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @12:40AMRe:Common enemy by ForumTroll (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @12:41AMRe:Common enemy by Robocoastie (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @12:48AMRe:Common enemy by JoshRosenbaum (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @01:22AMRe:Common enemy by joelpt (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @05:46AMRe:Common enemy by mdwh2 (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @10:02AMRe:Common enemy by Baloo Ursidae (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @09:25PMRe:Since it runs on Google's proprietary servers, by metamatic (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @10:50AM1 reply beneath your current threshold. Good (Score:5, Interesting) by Solr_Flare (844465) on Wednesday October 12, @12:12AM (#13771009) Normally stuff like this from MS makes me shudder with dread. But the lack of a standard communication IM protocal has driven me crazy for years. Trillian and other programs are ways to get around that, of course. But, having a single standard would go a long way, and this is a nice step towards that. Compete in features you offer in your IM clients, but for heavens sake unify the networks. [ Reply to This Re:Good (Score:5, Informative) by aussie_a (778472) on Wednesday October 12, @12:35AM (#13771102) (http://gutterflycomix.com/thequeensland | Last Journal: Friday February 11, @05:09AM) Compete in features you offer in your IM clients, but for heavens sake unify the networks. That's a good point, but there's a problem. Microsoft and Yahoo aren't going to agree upon an open standard for their merged IM protocol (assuming it is a merged protocol they're talking about and not a trillian-type deal). They will then use their closed protocol to work on shutting out non-Microsoft-Yahoo approved clients (i.e. every other client not made by the two companies). If everyone agreed to only use one IM protocol, then it's going to have to be a closed standard because (based on past performance), Microsoft isn't willing to agree on an open standard, at least not for it's IM program. They will be able to use that to make it more difficult for the competition, the only competition they'll allow are Microsoft approved(TM) competitors (yup, if Microsoft has control of the standard they'll be able to decide who compete's with them) and keep changing the protocol in an attempt to lock-out non-approved competitors. And Microsoft's dislike for the GPL ensures they won't approve any GPL clients to use their protocol.In the past both Yahoo and Microsoft have shown a habit of locking out third party clients, so this combination makes sense for them.If Microsoft and Yahoo and everyone else were willing to agree on an open standard for IM communication, then that would be great and I'd whole heartedly support it. I just can't see Microsoft doing that anytime soon. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Good by rtb61 (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @01:16AMRe:Good by mibus (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @02:12AMRe:Good by aussie_a (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @02:20AMRe:Good by mibus (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @03:08AMRe:Good by drew (Score:2) Wednesday October 12, @12:35PMMicrosoft already does by osssmkatz (Score:1) Wednesday October 12, @01:49PM1 reply beneath your current threshold. Lack of a standard IM protocol? (Score:4, Interesting) by Reality Master 201 (578873) on Wednesday October 12, @12:45AM (#13771138)