Google drops XMPP support
windowspbx.blogspot.com
windowspbx.blogspot.com
Thing is, as Larry said, they support open messaging but why should they do so with companies that don't reciprocate? Last week, Microsoft decided to take advantage of gtalk federated XMPP to make it usable inside Outlook, this is awesome. However, did they make skype usable inside of gmail? No. So Microsoft is happy to use google's messaging federated openness but refuses to share their messaging with Google which gives Microsoft an unfair advantage. As Larry said, they support openness but not to the point of shooting themselves in the foot by giving Microsoft a commercial advantage by integrating gtalk in Outlook while there's no way for Google to do so with Microsoft's Skype.
I think this is pretty fair from Google to defend themselves. And it really takes nerves from Microsoft for complaining about someone blocking them on their messaging network when they have been the king of blocking messaging network with MSN and Skype. Come on.
I prefer it when someone showcases their willingness to be 'the nicer guy' by opening up while the others are closing down. Like allowing to export your GMail contacts, while Facebook won't go the other way around.
I always find Microsoft complaining to be hypocritical, they are usually committing a similar overreach towards a competitor themselves. But still, where are the 'good guys'?
I know, that would be naïve, this is business.
Why would Google want to invest resources on giving Microsoft an unfair advantage over themselves? Microsoft being jerks is the rule since that open letter Bill Gates sent to the Homebrew Computer Club.
In other words, why would you invite a guest that is known to steal stuff and not flush toilets into your home?
Because it's good for the users.
microsoft permitting mitm/google ads in their product ftw
Think about this: Microsoft spent a fair amount of resources integrating with gtalk, now they can't use it. The only way for them to gain access is to open up their own platforms. Once they do, then everyone is on a more level playing field.
The days of Microsoft shafting the competition through lock-in and anti-competitive behaviour is fast coming to an end. I'm not shedding any tears.
So rather than waiting for Google to become the 'bigger man' (or Microsoft for that matter), which will likely never happen, I will move onto other services, because - fortunately - I have a choice.
My argument being, that if someone is trying to stop me changing services, because I am unhappy about the fact that Google are dropping or federalising their XMPP services, then 'Microsoft is doing the same thing' isn't the argument that is going to send me back to Google.
That said, if Google keeps locking down all their former open products/platforms, I will be fleeing ship.
If Hangouts (which replaces Gtalk) drops XMPP support, I see no reason to keep using it.
They don't know. Many of those people use multiple instant messengers in parallel, some even use messenger that speak multiple protocols. If these people knew they could interoperate all those, they'd find it awesome.
BTW, drm has nothing to do with interoperation. At least nothing negative, because it enables proprietary content to be delivered in a platform-neutral fashion. Thus killing one more reason to use/create proprietary browser plugins.
Maybe I am misunderstanding what happened here, but right now this looks like a perfect example of "see, this is why we can't have nice things," played out in the real world.
But Google is slowly giving me more and more reason to jump ship.
[1] Application I will miss that Google has not already killed (or is going to).
Disclaimer: I (obviously) work for FastMail. But still, you should check it out. :)
I have also read somewhere that you provide XMPP (or not?) but there's nothing like chat history[2]. Status - etc? I'm not very much familar with XMPP as in what it supports and what not.
Why does it want to me to have a FastMail email address where as all I am going to have is a user-name@my-domain.com. That's an extra Email ID to take care of or it's useless anyway if I'm not supposed to use it other than logging in, or is it[1]^. Looks like this is available in Family and Business account. That's odd. What's the point? Can you please provide a full side by comparison of Family - Biz - Enhanced - Premier?
Maximum attachment size is sth that ought to be at least 100MB (or 200MB in today's Internet) but that can be tolerated with Dropbox, CloudApp and all around.
One good thing is, I can use many domains in same account for just one price, this very attractive if I've read it right and seems you are a webhost too. Well, too many things.
I'm tempted but it doesn't seem to be a replacement for my mail-task-calendar-IM workflow which is very integrated and crucial.
Any words on that? And also, regarding [1]^, so you guys are nor email hosts as in email hosts now - just to confirm?
Glad to talk to someone directly at FM and not inside a support ticket.
[2] - saved as email, covered.
You need to pick a FastMail username to use to log in, even if you want to host your own domain. You never have to use this email address if you don't want to.
Family and business accounts are designed for hosting multiple separate accounts (with full separate logins) under the same (normally custom) domain, all on a single bill. There are features for administrating the different accounts and a shared address book. A personal (e.g. Enhanced) account is a single set of mailboxes/login, however can be used with multiple email addresses/domains.
Hope that answers your questions.
Given Google's service shutdowns, dropped support for protocols, and the horror stories of seemingly accidental account closures with no recourse, I simply cannot trust Google with something as critical as my email.
[1] http://gmailblog.blogspot.co.uk/2009/07/send-mail-from-anoth...
The only downside to the fastmail mail is you need ~200 spams learned before the bayseian filter kicks in, so the first two days were a bit "noisy" for me. After that, though, it reduced the ~10 spams per day that would make it through gmail down to 1 every other day.