andthennothing.net

Google is one of those companies that gets immidiate attention for every little move they make. They are praised even if something they’ve done is not that innovative. Sometimes it gets a bit tiresome, but mostly Google rumors are quite entertaining.

But there is a rumor that I hope is true, Google Talk, which is supposed to be a IM client with VoIP capabilities scheduled for release tomorrow. The one thing that makes this sound like a good thing to me is that it’s supposed to be Jabber based. If anyone besides the established IM companies can push Jabber into the mainstream it’s Google.

I think:

• there will be a web based (searchable) archive (perhaps part of Gmail)
• the feature set from Hello will be migrated over time (and Hello will be discontinued)
• the client will not have ads, but the (web) archive will almost certainly have ads
• it will have VoIP (as reported all over the place) with the ability to call normal phones in the future
• it will work behind NATs without any configuration
• it will work with the other IM networks (through transports)
• entertainment features (avatars, games etc) will be very limited from the beginning (but they are very much needed in the long run for mainstream adoption)
• RSS will be included in some form (so will a Blogger client)
• location will play some part
• video chat will take a while

I hope:

• it will play nice with other Jabber servers/clients
• any extensions to Jabber are open
• it ends the trend of only supporting Windows

I’m not sure what the killer feature(s) will be. You cannot start a IM service nowadays without something special. VoIP isn’t it, since everyone and their dog already have VoIP. A web based archive can be one part (I’m using IM from different computers so my logs are spread all over the place), and ad free client another. But neither of those are enough to start a migration from AIM, MSN, and Skype.

Let the IM war begin!

Good news—Gmail is now available for non-fully supported browsers with a stripped down, “normal” HTML interface. Bad news—Opera is not a fully supported browser, so you get the stripped down version even for the Opera 8 beta that worked in the fully fledged version before. It seems like you cannot have the cake and eat it, too.

Today I got 50 invites to Gmail. That’s quite a lot, I wonder if they are preparing to release it to the public soon.

If you want to try out Gmail, send me an e-mail or leave a comment (be sure to include your e-mail address).

Oh, and Gmail works fine with Opera 8 beta.

Today Gmail added a few new features: Gmail Notifier, Search your contacts, Automatic forwarding to another email account, and Save Draft. Ok, these are all minor changes… What about IMAP/POP support?

But what’s with the Gmail Notifier? They launched it quite a while ago. But there is a minor addition to the notifier: it is now possible to choose which browser it should launch. Finally. But hey, why doesn’t it use https://gmail.google.com/ (it opens http://gmail.google.com/), I’d like not to publish my password to the world, thanks.

By the way: does anyone know in which environment it is developed? Some of the help center pages are written in Python. Perhaps is Gmail a Python app?