ReadWriteWeb

Interoperability between instant messaging (IM) clients is something a lot of users have wished for. More specifically, we wish it was standard and provided right out of the box instead of having to turn to third parties such as Adium, Digsby, Trillian, or Pidgin. Yet there seems to be a problem with the concept of interoperability for the companies of the more popular IM clients.

Last month, Facebook rolled out Facebook chat to its entire network of users. Now, you can chat with all your Facebook friends without adding yet another Facebook app. However, we all know that next generation apps won't be pushed around by the browser and we don't think that Facebook chat is an exception to this theory. So here are a few ways to use Facebook chat outside of Facebook.

There are more and more ways to get your instant messaging done, with a large number of new online and offline clients from third parties. With so many instant messaging options, it's hard to figure out which one to use. Below, we've listed a large number of online and offline instant messengers, as well the various protocols supported by each, so that you can more easily find the one that's right for you. There's really not all that much difference between each except in interface and supported protocols. The best option for you will likely be the one that supports the networks your friends connect to and has an interface that you feel comfortable using. If there are any we've missed, please mention them in the comments. (Note: we did not link to any official offline clients.)

Finnish short messaging and microblogging service Jaiku has been acquired by Google, the company says. That Google bought this competitor of Twitter, the service founded by Blogger founder Evan Williams, instead of Twitter is notable. Jaiku may be stronger on the mobile platform than Twitter and probably came at a much lower price.

Google has been rolling up no end of very young mobile services; while the comparison with the Dodgeball acquisition, which ended up going nowhere, is inevitable - I think there's a lot more going on this time around. For one thing, Jaiku will now have access to scaling that Twitter could desperately use.

For background on Jaiku, I recommend this video interview by the new European outfit Intruders.tv with company founder Jyri Engestrom, trained as a sociologist and formerly from Nokia.

RedMonk analyst James Governor, who has blogged extensively about the business value of Jaiku competitor Twitter and whose Twitter feed I learned about the acquisition from, has some interesting thoughts on the news. Governor says he'd like to see RIM buy Twitter but thinks Yahoo! is much more likely. He says the Jaiku mobile download could be a key addition to the Google Phone kernel but fears that all the leading microblogging services will be quickly overrun with commercial messages. I think that's a valid concern and worry that ads could drown out the links I Twitter promoting my blog posts. (Joking.) All of Twitter is lit up with conversation on the acquisition, according the the tracking service Twitterverse, the hottest word across Twitter in the last hour is Jaiku. There's more good discussion there than I can post here.

With easy group creation, RSS import and threaded conversation, amongst other features, Jaiku is probably a superior service to Twitter. Twitter's API and large US community offers its own advantages for some users. Unfortunately, new accounts have been throttled at Jaiku with news of the announcement. That seems like a move that's a bit hostile to the early adopter types who are following this news now and a real lost opportunity.

Update: Here's the official Google statement about this exciting news.

Trillian Astra, the next version of the popular Windows multi-client chat application Trillian, is being developed for the Mac. Cerulean Studios, the makers of Trillian, has released a limited and experimental Mac version to approved testers of their new Astra platform. Hopefully a working version will be made available for general release someday; Astra itself as been in invite-only Alpha stage for nearly a full year now.

Testers can grab the download here and readers interested in becoming testers can go here.

Trillian on Mac is something that many people have waited for for a long time. It's an aesthetically pleasing, feature rich service with a very loyal group of users. Trillian Astra users can chat seamlessly with friends on Yahoo!, ICQ, AIM, Bonjour, Windows Live, Google Talk and MySpace IM. There's a web component of the new service, an RSS ticker and more - see a screenshot of the pared down Mac version below.

The particulars of this service as opposed to others are better experienced than they are described. Other multi-client chat tools include the open source Pidgin (formerly known as GAIM) on Windows and Adium on Mac.

See a screenshot of the current Mac build below the fold.

Twitter has been a runaway success since the status message inspired web app launched about a year ago. Its rapid adoption, ease of use and extensibility resulted in a lot of excited developers taking Twitter's best bits and mixing them up to their own ends. FranticIndustries and the Twitter Fan Wiki together present a comprehensive list of Twitter mash-ups and extensions. But what to try first? Here's our selection of the most interesting and practical Twitters apps.

Open, freedom, dynamic, flexibility. Not words you'd traditionally associate with AOL. But they're pushing on with their Open AIM platform, announcing more upgrades to it today. The latest updates are:

- Support for AIM Bots
- Location-based services
- PC-to-PC voice calling
- Support for developers working on the Mac OS X, Linux, and Pocket PC platforms - or with the Java language.

Together with the AIM Pages platform, which IMO is ahead of the curve in integrating external services into its social networking offering, this shows that AOL is adapting big time to the new rules of the Web.

Open AIM was launched in March and (according to the press release blurb) "empowers companies, communities and independent developers to build customized plugins, communications clients and mash-ups that access AOL's global instant messaging network." So basically AOL lets developers leverage its market-leading IM platform - which has 43 Million users according to AOL. And now they apparently have more than 45,000 developers working with the AIM Software Development Kit (SDK).

Seeing as IM is such a huge hit with the MySpace generation, it'll be interesting to see what people develop using Open AIM - and what mashups will evolve. The only way to find out is to open up, so AOL has to be given kudos for doing so. Of course, the fact that MySpace has IM too and the likes of Skype and Yahoo are big threats - doesn't hurt innovation in the IM space :-)

AIM Bots

I need to investigate these AIM Bots some more, because they sound fascinating:

"AIM Bots are dedicated, opt-in Screen Names that help developers, marketers and individuals create new connections and establish strong bonds with contacts in the AIM community. In addition, AIM Bots can support audio calls, file transfers and picture sharing. For example, an AIM Bot could be created to let users send pictures or podcasts to their blogs.

AIM Bots respond automatically to instant messages (IMs) they receive and can maintain IM conversations with multiple users - reaching up to 10,000 people per day - before encountering limits.** To prevent IM spam, AIM Bots cannot initiate IMs without permission."

They also sound kind of dodgy, in terms of being bearers of spam and advertising. As a recent Slashdot article put it: AIM Bots: Useful or Spam? But still, I'm sure AIM Bots have their good uses!

disclaimer: I've done a tiny bit of work for AOL in the recent past, via Marc Canter's BBM. Just so you know.