The hype from Google Talk is quickly dissolving. Initially it was a gift from the heavens for support Jabber – an open standard for instant messaging. Open standards are important because then no single company or service can own instant messaging and networks can be opened.
Sadly, though, Google has chosen not to embrace this most wonderful aspect of Jabber. Instead, they’ve created just another isolated IM network. As a Google Talk user, a person has a jabber address (@gmail.com, mirroring their email address) but the Google Jabber servers do not talk with the other Jabber servers on the net. A Google Talk user is just as cut off from the world as an AIM user is.
Imagine if Gmail users could only email other Gmail users.
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