Google Talk – A Second Look

Brian Ambrozy 3 Sep, 2005 at 1:45am ET Article published in Tech

Comments

1. 
   3 Sep 2005 ~ 2:03am GrayFox Very well writen .
2. 
   3 Sep 2005 ~ 2:36am Leonardo Well written. Proud to have it at Short-Media.
3. 
   3 Sep 2005 ~ 2:51am Trogan Interesting read
4. 
   3 Sep 2005 ~ 6:16am dragonV8 I like reviews that: "call a spade, a spade".
   
   Very well written and to the point. Good job Matt.
5. 
   3 Sep 2005 ~ 8:57am mmonnin MSN was the IM program at my HS. I heard from someone who graduated a year ahead of me that no one around his college used MSN at all, everyone used AIM. AIM is the national common IM program if there was one.
   
   If you were to take a list of my MSN and AIM contact list it would be something like this:
   MSN: Friends/People from back home mostly
   AIM: College friends and people I know on the internet.
   
   ICQ was never big back at home. mIRC was big for awhile tho, then my hometown kinda moved to MSN.
6. 
   4 Sep 2005 ~ 2:02pm Linc Thanks guys
7. 
   4 Sep 2005 ~ 5:50pm EMT

   mmonnin wrote:

   If you were to take a list of my MSN and AIM contact list it would be something like this:
   MSN: Friends/People from back home mostly
   AIM: College friends and people I know on the internet.

   
   Were you from more of a small town or a metro area? Everyone I know at college already used AIM except one roommate from a small town in IL.
   
   However, everyone I met in China used MSN and/or this program called QQ--AIM is probably pretty American.
   
   Anyway, good article, it will be interesting to see how this program shapes up.
8. 
   4 Sep 2005 ~ 7:46pm Camman interesting article, but personally it came off as a little fan-boyish to me, maybe just my interpretation.
   
   I did like the auto timestamp and popup notification of actual messages and not just sign on/sign off like AIM. Overall, I still prefer AIM, but that could be just because everyone I know already uses it, and the AIM client is a big mess with ads that is irritating
   
   The one thing about GT that did annoy me was this point that you made

   I can’t figure out how it picks the name to display. In some cases, my friends were displaying their Gmail account name in the message window. In other cases, their real name was displayed. Between us, we couldn’t find any rhyme or reason to the pattern. However, you can rename how all your buddies appear on your list so I suppose it isn’t a big deal; just slightly annoying.

   
   maybe just a weird beta flaw or something but there was no pattern at all to it.
9. 
   5 Sep 2005 ~ 12:22pm mmonnin I am from a fairly small town, about 20k or so I think it is. The MSN thing kinda seemed to be just my hometown as once I moved out people had AIM instead.
10. 
    5 Sep 2005 ~ 1:41pm lemonlime Great article..
    
    Personally, I like the simplicity of GT. The one thing I despise about MSN (and hotmail too for that matter) is the graphical 'online dating' adds and clutter, like tabs for checking stocks, etc. Being from an mIRC background, I can use my imagination, and do without the emoticons etc.
    
    I just signed up for gmail as well, and I love it.
    
    I think we need a new field in the user cp for GT address (i think there are only four fields right now)..
11. 
    5 Sep 2005 ~ 2:09pm kanezfan I guess I'm the only one who thought Gtalk sucks, just seems to be a "we can do that too" type of product. No reason for me to want to use it so far. I installed it, turned it on, looked around, then uninstalled it. But then maybe I'm lame like that :s
12. 
    7 Sep 2005 ~ 8:03am DogSoldier Tried it, couldn't connect. The reason being, this thing requires you have a Gmail account.. No Problem! To get Gmail, you need only 2 things, a mobile phone YES! And American citizenship NO!
13. 
    7 Sep 2005 ~ 9:09am GHoosdum What? You need a phone to get GMail now?
    
    You need American citizenship too? Why??
14. 
    7 Sep 2005 ~ 9:16am dragonV8

    DogSoldier wrote:

    Tried it, couldn't connect. The reason being, this thing requires you have a Gmail account.. No Problem! To get Gmail, you need only 2 things, a mobile phone YES! And American citizenship NO!

    
    Unless Gmail has changed, i'm Australian and don't have a mobile phone and have 2 Gmail accounts. Perhaps it is related to which country one is in when signing up.
    
    Still have another hundred to give away too.
15. 
    7 Sep 2005 ~ 11:32am mmonnin

    kanezfan wrote:

    I guess I'm the only one who thought Gtalk sucks, just seems to be a "we can do that too" type of product. No reason for me to want to use it so far. I installed it, turned it on, looked around, then uninstalled it. But then maybe I'm lame like that :s

    
    I dont get it either. I see the people using as the same type as those that switched to Firefox just because other people were using and they think MSN/IE sucks just because its made by microsoft. In my opinion Google is just going to be the next M$ and they want to take over the world. Sure I have the Gmail, The google toolbar, and I use Google.com but its going too far. No need for google search or this GT thing. I got invited for Yahoo's voice chat the other day as well so its not like google is the only one with voice chat.
    
    Yeah Google went public with it and it needs a cell phone number so people dont sign up accounts just for spamming. Didnt know about the American citizenship thing tho.
16. 
    7 Sep 2005 ~ 1:47pm kanezfan Well, Firefox had one thing IE didn't have, tabbed browsing, and that's why I switched. That and the safety factor did it for me. Gtalk however, I don't know, it smacks of fanboy-ism.
17. 
    7 Sep 2005 ~ 10:32pm mmonnin I just mentioned it because some people switched to firefox because of no other reason than that other people are doing it.
18. 
    7 Sep 2005 ~ 11:55pm Thrax I was the fellow with the car analogy. I maintain that Googletalk simultaneously tries too hard, and doesn't try hard enough. I have no use for it.
19. 
    8 Sep 2005 ~ 12:27am Linc

    mmonnin wrote:

    Yeah Google went public with it and it needs a cell phone number so people dont sign up accounts just for spamming. Didnt know about the American citizenship thing tho.

    Invitations still work perfectly well. Let me know if you want one, DogSoldier

    Thrax wrote:

    I was the fellow with the car analogy.

    I credited you in the original but it was edited out
20. 
    14 Sep 2005 ~ 4:48pm Sledgehammer70 Well written.... But No thanks to GT, Sure it has phone and e-mail. but I use outlook for e-mail and I pay for a cell phone. I don't sit at my computer to talk on the phone, unless I am on hold with a bank or a company RMA sector.
    
    In all I think people online want flashy gadgets and fun Messengers, not the stripped down bare bones model like GT is. I use Vent, AIM, and MSN. why I use all 3 is because I like the features of some over others and my friends are very diverse in there app's so I am forced to be mixed up with all of them.
    
    In all to me GT is another way for Google to take over online features. They are a huge company and are growing daily. Pretty soon we will all be work for Google