Open AIM: AOL opens its Instant Messaging protocol

Posted by Mickaël Rémond on March 05, 2008

Today, AOL relaunched its OpenAIM initiative and published the specifications of the AIM and ICQ protocol.

OpenAIM is an initiative from AOL that aims at building a development community around its Instant Messaging service and protocol. This time it seems that they are dedicated to seriously open their Instant Messaging network and give access to their IM platform. You can now officially build a compliant AIM / ICQ client, use the platform to push presence back and forth, write plugins and bots that plug to the AIM network. The protocol is called Oscar and fully described here.

This is a very clever move from AOL. They decided that the value lies in their users base and in the network they provide. They thus want to grow the community usage of their platform. Revenue is based on advertising. You can filter ads in your client but you can also decide to build an ads supported software and benefit from AOL advertising network. You will thus be able to share advertissement revenues with AOL. I bet that MSN and Yahoo! will now think about the large set of opportunity that this model opens.

What does this move mean for the Instant Messaging community ? Simply, it means that building a client for AIM is now officially possible. Building an Instant Messaging aggregator is possible regarding the AIM / ICQ protocol aggregation.

For ProcessOne, it also means that AOL and ICQ gateway software can be published officially. Maybe it is time to dream about the most scalable AIM / ICQ gateway ever published (hint, hint !).

AOL has now opened the AIM / ICQ platform and protocol. Now, there is no major reason to not fully adopt the XMPP protocol. See my previous blog post on that topic for more information: The AOL XMPP scalability challenge. The missing part is still allowing to chat with a contact without requiring an AIM or ICQ account. In the XMPP world, this is called federation. I am not convinced that they will do this move if they managed to extend advertisements and revenue sharing to this larger community.




Categories: Jabber / XMPP  

Comments

anonymous avatar

Unfortunately, AOL’s ‘Open AIM’ is still the same misnomer as it was when Open AIM SDK was first release – they basically laugh at all free/open-source developers.

Please, read their licensing terms before you promote AOL’s step. I made the same mistake.

Posted by Lukáš 'Spike' Polívka on 06 Mar 2008 at 00:05



 
anonymous avatar

This part: What does this move mean for the Instant Messaging community ? Simply, it means that building a client for AIM is now officially possible. Building an Instant Messaging aggregator is possible regarding the AIM / ICQ protocol aggregation.

This is not permitted, sorry about that :)

Posted by melo on 06 Mar 2008 at 11:08



 
Mickaël Rémond's avatar

There is a discrepancy between the FAQ and term of service and with the blog post announcement on:

http://www.gregsmind.com/2008/03/05/open-aim-20/

For example, look at the multi-headed client restrictions: both text says the reverse.

I bet (and hope) that the FAQ (term of service) is not up to date.

Posted by Mickaël Rémond on 06 Mar 2008 at 12:47



 
anonymous avatar

From what I remember, Oscar’s not federated. That’s the real downfall here, especially if their community does take off. I’m curious how that scales for the rest of us.

Posted by Nolan Eakins on 07 Mar 2008 at 18:32



 
Mickaël Rémond's avatar

Yes, true. It means you have to have an AIM account to chat with AIM users.
Anyway, I feel that one step at a time we are heading in the right direction.
IM is slowly but surely getting more open and my vision is that it will ultimately benefit to XMPP.
I am sure Internet standards are the future of instant messaging. Yes, it takes time, but time play in favor of those standards.

Posted by Mickaël Rémond on 08 Mar 2008 at 23:17



 
anonymous avatar

Excellent review Mickaël Rémond!!! AIM sounds really good. Very good initiative taken by AOL. Keep the good work going.

Posted by Preethi on 30 May 2008 at 10:15



 
anonymous avatar

AOL is great and AIM is perfect.
Keep up!

Posted by Kavin on 01 Aug 2008 at 06:58



 
anonymous avatar

how do you get one

Posted by Zoey on 09 Aug 2008 at 18:57



 
anonymous avatar

why can’t I put this aims back on to my computer

Posted by helen meyers on 25 Jan 2009 at 15:20



 


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