AOL Going The Wrong Direction On IM

from the the-debate-that-never-dies dept

For years, people have been complaining that AOL is going in the wrong direction with instant messaging by not opening up their software and setting a standard that all instant messaging products can use to communicate with each other. They don't even combine their own competing products (AIM and ICQ). There's absolutely nothing new in this commentary piece saying that this is a big mistake by AOL, but it just confirms that not much of anything is happening in that area. At this point, it probably makes sense for everyone but AOL to simply join forces and create their own standard. Between Yahoo and MSN and all the various smaller players, suddenly AOL could discover that they don't have a lead any more. Update: In somewhat related news, Trillian has now released their Trillian Pro, for-pay IM client. It will be interesting to see if people actually go for it.