Gtalk's Jazayeri: IM "Service Federation"

Good news for those awaiting highly or totally interoperable instant messaging (IM)! Google appears to be working on a solution.

Per Mike Jazayeri, a Google Talk product manager, Gtalk "...is merely the first in what could be a whole "communications suite" of applications. "We are investing in a real-time communications platform," he said in an interview. "Google Talk is the first instance of that." Google is interested in "service federation," the idea that users can use any service with any chat program they want." If any company has the money and brainpower to connect all the IMs, it's Google. It wouldn't be surprising if some Googlers are already spending their 20% time on IM service federation... See Arstechnica for their full article about Gtalk.

It looks like in the near future Luke W won't have to fire up Gtalk to IM me. He uses AIM most of the time. Because of Google's investment in AOL, it is expected Gtalk and AIM will be talking to each other soon. Luke will be able to continue to use AIM but also be able to IM to my Gtalk account.

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