Yes, rumour! Yes, screen shots! Yes, confirmed server running! At last, Google Instant Messenger is coming... TODAY.

Let's just hope


  1. 100% Jabber-compliant protocol - so I can pick a favourite Jabber-enabled IM app. Open market wins?

  2. Can re-use gmail email address as Messenger ID, not another ID-Password pls

  3. They're running all the gateway transports (lets u comms with buddies on MSN, Yahoo, ICQ, AOL, blah..) - this one quite hard, sure clash with other companies...


Privacy? You never had - get over it (unless you've been using Tor)


Update: Ok, Google Talk released. 2 out of 3.



We plan to partner with other willing service providers to enable federation of our services.



Update 2: Acknowledged. Without avatar/picture, emoticons... and Google Talk itself can't be used as a generic Jabber client... *sigh* still quite lame, only a hardcore fan like me can get excited.