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September 01, 2005
It's lucky that Yahoo and Google didn't invent e-mail
It's something that we all take for granted. If we want to e-mail our friend, it doesn't matter which e-mail system we use or which e-mail system they use, we know that it will work just fine.
A system called "Jabber" provides the same benefits for instant text messaging. Two systems are available which do the same thing for voice communications, called "SIP" and "IAX". All of these systems are open, published, patent-unencumbered specifications, which anybody can use for free.
This week, Google and Yahoo both introduced their new voice and instant messaging programs. So, they naturally picked these systems which would allow all of their customers to talk to anybody they wanted to, right? Well, actually... no.
Yahoo's new "Yahoo Messenger With Voice" follows the same closed, proprietary approach that has been the hallmark of their instant messaging program since it was first released. Unless all of your friends are also Yahoo users, you will not be able to instant message or talk to them. You also can't receive calls from people using the plain old telephone system.
How about Google? Since their "Google talk" program is completely new, there's no reason they can't ensure that it plays nice with everybody else's system. In fact, they even paid lip-service to open communication. Things look really encouraging when you discover that they use Jabber to power their system. This is where things get bizarre. In their system, they have closed off the ability for Jabber servers to talk to each other, which means that even although they use the open Jabber system, Google users cannot talk to any other Jabber user, they can only talk to other Google users. The strangeness doesn't stop there. Rather than using one of the established, open voice protocols, they have invented their own, which sits on top of Jabber. So that means that Google users can only chat with other Google users--not with users of any other voice over Internet system, or folks using the plain old telephone system.
Posted by at September 1, 2005 11:25 PM
Comments
Actually, a minor clarification... it appears that Google haven't entirely "closed off the ability for Jabber servers to talk to each other". Instead, they are only accepting instant messages from servers which they have approved. If you run a server, you have to plead with them to let your users talk to their users. They don't seem to have actually allowed any other instant messaging servers into their walled-off community at this stage.
Posted by: Jeremy Howard at September 1, 2005 11:39 PM