AOL and Jabber

AOL and Jabber. AOL Wants to Back Out of IM Promise.  AOL has been playing monopolist with its instant messaging for as long as the genre has been popular, pretending to want interoperability but largerly refusing to let other IM operators interconnect with AOL Instant Messager. One of the condititions of the buyout of Time Warner was that AOL had to open up when and if it added video to its IM offering.

You will be distinctly unsurprised to learn that AOL is now weaseling out of even that small promise, as this New York Times story suggests.

Depressingly but also unsurprisingly, the FCC is likely to okay AOL's request. Under the Bush administration and its appointee, FCC Chairman Michael Powell, monopolistic practices are officially fine.

Thanks again, Ralph Nader! [Dan Gillmor's eJournal]

AOL played around with the IETF for a couple of years, before admitting they had no intention of opening up their IM spec.   Now that Jabber has been officially dubbed “the open IM format” – AOL wants to have the FCC take away the restrictions placed on them.  This also goes back to “why did the DOJ chase after Microsoft's monopolistic behaviors about BROWSERS and not all their other kinds of monopolistic behavior”.

Maybe because AOL wanted to keep their own monopolistic behaviors as well?

Isn't that what's called a “lock-in” strategy?  Don't Blogger and Moveable Type ALSO want to become the AOL or Microsoft of blogging?  What's the difference?  [Marc's Voice]

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