We Need a Single Chat Protocol

I once posted about how it seems like people don’t make use of online instant messengers like they used to. I remember a day when I’d sign onto AOL or Yahoo and I’d see a half a dozen people that were online. I would have expected popularity to grow as more and more people were connected to the Internet full time. For a while, it seemed to be that way, with friends staying online around the clock (mostly in an Away status). But today, usage appears to be a drop in the bucket compared to those days years ago. Perhaps that is just my own personal perception. After all, I am but one user that I am basing this whole thing on.

Wouldn’t it be great if we had a single protocol to use for instant messaging, as we do for email? I want the medium to create a single way of making it all work as one, with companies competing to have the best application to serve computer users. Friends and Buddies would be universal, and everyone could be active on the same network, mobile users included.

Personally, I hate IRC, which is indeed a standard prototol, but I am not talking about that in this discussion. I am keeping this specifically about the traditional instant messenger programs. Today, there are an awful lot of chat solutions out there. I want the networks of AOL, Yahoo, MSN, ICQ, Google (Jabber), etc. to become a single, industry-standard network. I have friends scattered all over the three big networks and it is ridiculous to manage. Having so many people spread so thin over these networks makes for everyone’s suffering in the end. With new technologies like MySpace becoming so overwhelmingly popular, I think the IM programs of yesterday need to merge into one to create a force that won’t become replaced or abandoned.

I’d actually read about this kind of proposal years ago. I heard that AOL was going to open up their network for use by everyone, and write a draft for an IM standard. At the time, AOL was the most popular IM service. I do not know if that is still true today. Obviously, the opening up of their network never happened and an industry standard was never created. I wonder if the will is still there today for this type of idea. We desperately need it, or I fear everyone’s buddy list will start to dry up as people switch to whatever the latest thing happens to be at the moment.

Until such a day, I’ll continue to use Adium on my Mac and Meebo on my PC as a way to access all of my chat services in one place. Vendor chat software like the real AOL Instant Messenger have become so bloated and full of ads, it is a wonder why anyone would even consider using them. Yahoo does make a good product, but the amount of memory it consumes is a little staggering, as is true with about all of them, as more features are stacked on to compete with the other guys. Perhaps some of the bloat in these programs can be trimmed by merging, as well. Sounds like a winning idea to me.