Opening Up IM Not Important Any More
from the for-the-shortsighted,-perhaps... dept
There used to be all this talk (from companies like Microsoft and Yahoo, even) about how we need an open instant messaging standard to allow various IM products to talk to each other (which really meant allowing Yahoo and Microsoft's IM to talk to market leading AOL's IM products). Now, however, it appears that Microsoft and Yahoo have quieted down and there's no real push to open up IM anymore. It seems that both Yahoo and Microsoft have signed up enough customers that they're now seeing the value of keeping things closed. What this completely ignores is that it completely pisses off most users, who need to have multiple IM products all running at once. The article quotes one user who doesn't mind multiple clients as if that's conclusive evidence that no one wants an open IM standard at all. I'd say the number of people using products like Trillian and Fire suggests otherwise...
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
Use Jabber
[ link to this | view in thread ]