I like these questions :-) but I'm going to answer them out of order.
3) I use IM all the time, mostly to chat to Jess during the day but also Katy - we IM'd lots in particular during Polyday setup. It's somewhere inbetween texts and conversation in immediacy, and free, which is very handy.
1) Imagine if you and I couldn't email each other because you were on Microsoft email but I was on Yahoo email. That's the state of IM standards like MSN and YIM, which don't talk to each other. Email doesn't have that problem because there's a single uniting set of standards through which Yahoo's email system talks seamlessly to Microsoft's. Anyone can become part of the email network by setting up their own server, as I have - you don't hav to ask anyone's permission.
Jabber is the "email-like" IM system. And the benefits are right there in the answer to your question 2.
2) Your googlechat account will IM quite happily to my LJ account, and not because Google and LiveJournal have some sort of deal but because they are both part of the wider Jabber network. You don't have to download anything new - if you have Google Talk, you can talk to me on IM.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2007-01-22 11:36 am (UTC)3) I use IM all the time, mostly to chat to Jess during the day but also Katy - we IM'd lots in particular during Polyday setup. It's somewhere inbetween texts and conversation in immediacy, and free, which is very handy.
1) Imagine if you and I couldn't email each other because you were on Microsoft email but I was on Yahoo email. That's the state of IM standards like MSN and YIM, which don't talk to each other. Email doesn't have that problem because there's a single uniting set of standards through which Yahoo's email system talks seamlessly to Microsoft's. Anyone can become part of the email network by setting up their own server, as I have - you don't hav to ask anyone's permission.
Jabber is the "email-like" IM system. And the benefits are right there in the answer to your question 2.
2) Your googlechat account will IM quite happily to my LJ account, and not because Google and LiveJournal have some sort of deal but because they are both part of the wider Jabber network. You don't have to download anything new - if you have Google Talk, you can talk to me on IM.