What happens when the corporation anybody seems to love to hate, namely Microsoft, release a killer app and of makes it free (as in dollars), but, of course, keeps its source jealously closed? And worse than that, use it to maintain a strong lock-in to the Windows platform?Microsoft’s MSN Messenger is a bulky, overbloated messenging application. Its new beta (version 7) makes things even worse: it now allows you to ‘nudge’ the IM window of your correspondent (it shakes his/her IM window for a period of one or two seconds). Other new features allow users to send and receive annoying-as-Hell full screen Flash sequences, an easy white board integration, background bitmap sharing and of course, a good lot of merchandized artwork (the usual obnoxious emoticon pack plus new contents for every feature I just described). It has even its own blogging and photo sharing system. Young people love it.
Of course, the older MSN 6 features are still there. A big 96×96 pixel display picture (MSN variation of the avatar or buddy icon), very good webcam support (plug & play that really works), attractively themed windows. Other features include magical file transfers (magical in the sense that thanks to uPNP, file transfer actually work, even if you’re heavily firewalled/NAT’ed), a game system (from a basic and free tic tac toe to more evolved, for-money games) that works far from flawlessly and pretty bad audio support, far behind the current leader’s (Skype) abilities.
Young people in European countries just can’t live without MSN. Here, anyone in his teens or twenty-something has its MSN Messenger account (we usually call it MSN for short here, since nobody even knows that MSN is an ISP in the USA). Just give me your MSN and we’ll talk about it tonight’ is a sentence you’ll hear pretty everywhere, from elementary school to universities. Non-‘MSN’-users are being more marginalized everyday. Just as people (like me) who don’t want a cell phone are.
What does it have to do with Free and Open Source Software, you may ask? Well, the idea behind this rant is simple, if not simplistic. You’ll often read in this column, on Slashdot and on various other sites that ‘heavy’ software (more often cited examples are Microsoft Office, Adobe Photoshop & Illustrator or the Macromedia suite) keep people from using Free operating systems (i.e. any Linux or BSD flavor running KDE or GNOME). That’s true, but that’s far from being the complete story.
Can you connect to the MSN Messenger network using Free operating systems? Sure you can. There is Gaim, there is Kopete. Are they attractive? No, they aren’t. Their interfaces are terrible. Moreover, all you can do with them is write basic IMs. Bye bye overbloated and stupid nudge and Flash sequences. Just the text ma’am. Display picture? Well, it sort of works, but that’s all. File transfers? I can swear that you’re a lucky guy (girl) when it works. Usually it doesn’t, resulting in embarrassing ‘Sorry mate, I’m using Linux, you know and, well, could you mail me this picture instead?’.
And boy are they ugly. Compare a MSN Messenger 7 chat window and a Gaim window. Gaim (or Kopete for that matter) is so austere that the comparison looks unfair even to people who, like me, usually hate themed windows and flashy-for-the- sake-of-being-flashy interfaces.
Will it keep me from using other OSes than Windows? Certainly not. Will it keep young people from using them? You bet. And that’s the point of this long rant. Office and creative applications, are undoubtely important tools for keeping Windows’ (and to a lesser extent, Mac OS X’s) lock-in on the Desktop. But I can’t understand why every Free and Open Source advocate basically snobs IM’s. Gaim and Kopete are just not good enough. I mean that their target public (i.e. young people) just won’t care to use it (I understand that some people, me included, can live with them. We just aren’t the target public).
We have OpenOffice.org, we have FireFox. Both are doing well in their respective domains. Why do we keep thinking that Gaim’s so ‘1999-2000’ tools are good enough? They aren’t and it’s my opinion — and I’d really like it to be false — that it’s a major problem to address in the next few months in order to increase the admission of Free and Open Source software on the desktop. A problem that has to be addressed very, very quickly, before it becomes even worse.
About the author:
Stéphane Rieppi lives in Belgium and is majoring in sociology at the University of Liège. He has a strong passion for Free and Open Source computing and is working on a thesis about Free and Open Source software seen from a
sociological viewpoint.
If you would like to see your thoughts or experiences with technology published, please consider writing an article for OSNews.
msn messenger? oh god! please no…
Nudge well that is the most useless feature in time… well apart from cammras on phones. Note anyone that works with sensitive matter will be banned from taking the phone to work.
And what about those POINTLESS tabs on the side pitty you cant turn them off. Why use open source? Why fill bug reports?? Why botther telling Microsoft about a vunribility when they will only ask for money for support (note this happend to me with SP1 and Msn 4.7).
You forgot to mention all the DRM bloating the OS. I am sorry if I sound heated but why is our good money going into development of nudges and useless tabs when that money is better spent on FIXing bugs and exploits. Its a mine field out there and they are still swinging in the playground.
I’m not sure exactly how popular MSN messenger is in Europe but in America it doesn’t seem very popular. I’ve never come accross someone who said, “Hey, do you have an MSN Messenger name?” More often then not I hear, “Do you have AIM?”
As for full page flash sequences, I’m not even sure if that is something that can be implemented in Gaim or Kopete. As far as file transfer and direct IM images in Gaim (which I use), I’ve had little problems once I’ve set up my router correctly.
As far as asthetics, MSN messenger may have fancy skins but Gaim on my computer is not ugly. I believe on Windows it is pretty limited in looks because the GTK toolkit isn’t very themeable in that environment. The interface, however, isn’t horrible. It isn’t the best but it sure beats AIM.
Overall this article seemed to not stay on topic. It talks of MSN messenger then jumps to how lack of hot applications keeps users away from Linux and other open source operating systems. Yes, we all know Linux needs some kind of Flash MX or Photoshop equivalent, and as long as there is demand someone will eventually try to fill that gap.
Does anyone who matters use MSN Messenger or even MSN? I think I encounter an MSN e-mail address or URL a few times a year, at best. Perhaps this is because Microsoft is a very very small part of my life.
/me pets BeOS’ IMKit
http://www.eiman.tv/imkit/index.html
i dont understand this artical at all, it bashes MSN for being good at connecting to its OWN service, and bashes other free alts, at being not as good, this guy is gold!!! i’d hold on to him for being award winning. heck, ya know what, give me another write up when someone says openoffice isnt as good as MS office and BLAMES MS for being so good at what they do.
MSN Messenger is extremely popular in asian or latin american countries, or places with low resources where most internet users connect from a cyber-bar. This is because in most cases, such messenger already comes integrated to windows. The OS is locked there (means you cant install apps on it) and msn is the easier/friendlier alternative as it comes very deeply integrated to windows.
Another thing i’ve noticed with MSN is that “just works”. Even if i only have used linux clients, it by far works much better than yahoo or AIM, and not even mention ICQ.
yahoo is a lot more bloated than MSN andchanges protocol all the time.. ICQ sometimes just doesnt send messages, or gives you problems logging in, and AIM simply lets me login but never shows me when other users are connected.
So basically, even if I use Linux, MSN Messenger is the only real choice I have. It works best, and it’s what everyone here uses. Yet, I know that if they ever change protocol or something and force updates, I’ll be royally screwed.
An interesting article, and I agree with a good number of the points presented. I’m currently using an XP / Gentoo dualboot, and for all my IM’ing purposes I actually prefer using Gaim to the bloat of even MSN6. Features such as logging, away messages and hyperlinking are far more developed in Gaim than in MSN6, and I feel that with a correct shift of focus towards the other “indispensable” novelty features, Gaim could easily be the Firefox or OpenOffice of the IM clients.
(Or Kopete, but I have zero experience with that).
I’m able to connect to MSN messenger just fine on Linux using Gaim. While I don’t get chat or webcam and the like I do get IM abilities.
As far as “just working” I haven’t had any problems using Gaim for Yahoo, AIM, MSN, or ICQ. (I don’t use it for any other protocols, so I wouldn’t know).
If you like so much the MSN Messenger look, you can also try aMSN (it also has the nudges), it comes in Linux, OSX and Windows flavors…
http://amsn.sourceforge.net/
I agree this topic doesnt deserve this place, it should have been a blog thread or something.
But you cant deny that we dont have a free IM for Linux which can
a) Voice Chat
b) Deply the Webcam
c) File Transfer Without Errors
d) Look great!
Ofcourse the
a) Multi IM Protocols and
b) Better Security [remember there anre many loopholes in the MSN Messenger!]
are a blessing!
But what use is that if I cant voice chat and use webcam with any of the IM Friends.
Although I may add Gyach Extended PY Voice chat is good but doesnt match the main ones!
I use amsn myself and I enjoy the looks and features it provides and can’t complain on my XP box or Gentoo box
Seems like very little difference other then amsn is lighter by far…
And what about those POINTLESS tabs on the side pitty you cant turn them off.
Actually, you can. The option is in the privacy tab (who knows why).
Anyway, what is the point of this article.. that open source IM clients are ugly? Yep they are.. why not help them out or make your own instead of whinging about it?
. Audium for OSX is pretty good looking from what i’ve seen (don’t have my own mac until the mini is out).
So now its hip to say MSN Messenger is “tied” and “deeply integarated” into the OS? OH PLEASE GIVE ME A BREAK.
Next I’m going to start seeing posts like Notepad is too firmly entrenched into the system. Or posts that cmd.com is just a another attempt at proprietary lock-in because you can’t drop in your fav old version of DR-DOS as a replacement.
If you think gaim stinks – go write something better. Windows has Trillian which works wonderfully and looks nice; there is no reason why OSS can’t do the same thing.
…at least with all my friends here (I’m a university student in Toronto).
All my friends used to use ICQ but now all of them exclusively use MSN Messenger. Even some of my professors and staff at the university use MSN Messenger.
The pictures and emoticons are very popular and people like the look and feel of MSN Messenger than AIM or ICQ…
After all, MSN doesn’t have encrypted messaging service (gaim-encryption.sf.net), nor spell check, nor multiple account support, nor multiple protocol support, nor multiple platform support (Okay, they do have a Mac version, but when was the last time they updated it?) It can’t tell me if my buddy is idle or not, blocked me or not.
I can and do deny it.
http://gaim-vv.sourceforge.net/
Getting it to compile is the Devil’s work, but once you manage it, voice and video both work on MSN.
And – looks great? gaim looks fine for me. I’m not sure which idiot it was who wrote the rule that decreed ‘all applications should share a common interface as far as possible with the exception of messaging clients and media players’, but I sure as hell don’t want him to come anywhere near *my* desktop. I use gaim for messaging, Rhythmbox for music and Totem for video and I’m damned if I’m going to use any neon usability-nightmare the ‘kids’ this guy (patronisingly) wants to represent might try and foist on me.
eek, am I getting old?
btw, I do agree MSN is extremely popular. I currently live in Canada, I used to live in the U.K. and I have contacts all over the world; my gaim list shows a comfortable MSN majority, which is growing over time. AFAIK ICQ still has the absolute lead if you just count accounts, but a lot of ICQ accounts are inactive these days with people migrating to MSN.
…on using windows, why not look into a free alternative there, like Trillian which has always ‘just worked’ for me.
Either way, it’s a horrible article… even if you take it as an opinion piece.
Here in the Netherlands MSN Messenger has a market share of basically 100%. And to be quite honst, I just don’t really give a damn. MSN is NOT a bad and bloated IM client, that’s just pure nonsense. OSS zea… erm people say everything that isn’t OSS to be bloated, I don’t even pay attention to it anymore.
MSN is fast, reliable, easy, quick, has a decent interface, does video, audio, games, buddy icons, contact grouping etc. etc. It might ie. not do the audio/video as good as Skype does it, but hey, Skype is AIMED at doing that.
There’s only one thing I’d like to see: MSN support in iChat.
“Overall this article seemed to not stay on topic. It talks of MSN messenger then jumps to how lack of hot applications keeps users away from Linux and other open source operating systems. Yes, we all know Linux needs some kind of Flash MX or Photoshop equivalent, and as long as there is demand someone will eventually try to fill that gap.”
You really missed the point. It was perfectly on topic.
The argument people use for lockin to windows are things like MS Office and games but this guy is highlighting that there is another – for many (especially younger people) – far more important reason for the lockin and that is MSN Messenger.
None of the linux alternatives are as easy to set up, fully featured and pleasant on the eye together as MSNM is. MSNM as many have said just works.
I know from experience that when I made some kids use Linux for a while the *only* thing they bitched about – and I mean the only thing – was “Where is MSN? This thing is horrible! Why can’t I send files and where’s the webcam thing?”
Get a fully competent messenger program that doesn’t look like a dog’s breakfast or have needlessy archaic mechanisms to set it up (the account setup and connection method for GAIM; surely you can’t say it’s a wonder of UI design?) then that is one important barrier knocked over.
I agree with the author wholeheartedly having had the same experience but without having come to the obvious conclusion myself.
Here in Canada, we also love MSN. Forget AIM, forget ICQ, MSN is all you need. It’s really pretty good.
The title is “MSN Messenger 7: consolidating Windows’ lock-in strategy?” I don’t see how ranting about the lack of Dreamweaver for Linux relates to that or how “ugly” Gaim is.
Honestly I was expecting an article on how Windows tries to force out competitors by installing their version of software preloaded in the OS.
Problem is MSN uses it’s own network and methods of working. It’s closed source and Linux can’t access those features (nor other OSes) that are popular.
The closed sourced nature of flash and their webcam protocols don’t allow for Linux clients to access those MSN features… so should developers make an open alternative? Would it be able to catch on at all with Windows locking itself in by putting MSN Messenger in it’s OS?
I get the article’s point, I just think the title is misleading.
Tools / Accounts / Add – what’s so hard about that?
I’m sorry, I just don’t get where MSN is either pretty or has a good interface. It’s a hideous, eye-rending shade of light blue, since when was that pretty? Since when did it look remotely like anything else on your desktop? And the interface! I’m (forced) to use it quite often on my partner’s Windows PC and I still don’t know what half of it does. There’s tiny, near-invisible arrows all over the place which presumably have some mysterious purpose. It wastes vast realms of screen space on useless crap and adverts. No, sorry, MSN *does* have some good features, and the uPNP integration is astonishingly useful and _actually works_, but it’s an interface nightmare. I’ll take gaim – which actually *uses the system theme*, has tabs, and is extremely compact – any day. On Windows, either gaim or Trillian with a ‘standard Windows’ theme if I need its features.
Agreed.
I’ve had the same problem trying to get people to swap to firefox, showed them the themes to make it nice and they jumpped all over it.
The thing is before anyone will want to try something new its got to look nice. The same goes for everything in life, from computer software, hardware to girlfriends/boyfriends, cars and food.
Its very hard for the human mind to do otherwise. Of course ther are a select few who just want basic workings, or to be a rebel.
These people can run the crappy looking programs, because it does the basics, its not Microsoft etc.
If we take a look at our lives in the same way, these people will go for a car that’ll get them to work even if its a rust bucket throw back from the 70’s.
Maybe I just live under a rock, but of the 80-100 people in my GAIM contact list, about 70% use Yahoo Messenger… I live in Vegas now, but the people in my list are from all over the country (I’ve moved around a bit).
I only have about 5 people who use MSN, well, a couple more that have it as secondary accounts.
>>>>’Sorry mate, I’m using Linux, you know and, well, could you mail me this picture instead?’. <<<<<
haha… sans the “mate”… i believe I’ve said this exact sentence about 40 times per year since making the “switch”…
The author is correct in that linux IM clients are lacking in compatibility… and I’m sure its’ even more difficult for a handful of developers who work out of their dorms… to compete with multi-billion dollar corporations who purposely break compatability every so often…..
I wish Trillian.cc would produce a linux client…. their product may not be perfect, but i think it’d be popular if made available.
Somehow I managed to never get asked if I have MSN. Only one person I know to use an IM does not have ICQ. He uses iChat (AIM).
Maybe I’m lucky. Or things in Germany are different.
[rant]
Its a personal annoyance of mine, having to use msn, but alas, *everyone* else uses it.
I’m not sure if this is a cause or a effect of this, but everyone on msn always seem to have hotmail accounts, most dont appear to know that you dont actually need a hotmail account to use msn, but rather just a passport.net login.
Emailing hotmail users (used to at least) annoyed me to no end, send them a 2 meg attachment and it gets rejected. I find it amazing that so many people (I’m guessing hotmail to be the biggest webmail provider in the world?) put up with such a shit service for as long as they did (mailboxes are now 250MB, instead of the previous 2MB).
Of random note: msn goes down quite alot, not to mention I get disconnected if I try and download at the same time as using it (wtf? No other IM network did that to me). And theres not even a SSL option anywhere.
Damn newbies, they always end using and popularizing the crap standards.
[/rant]
Or you could just not use it. Any why are they complaining about a BETA of MSN? Who cares? I removed MSN from my XP install using nLite. Of the two people I know on MSN and the one I know one Yahoo (the rest on AIM), gaim for windows works just fine.
the author has a point. i live in europe also(portugal), and here i can almost say that 100% of IMers, use MSN Messenger. Things like ‘can i have your msn?’ are quiet common.. actually, nobody ever asked me IF i have a MSN account, they just assume everybody has one.
Sad actually, they are even stop using IRC and using the lousy chat rooms in MSN to talk with each other…
when is jabber going to stand up?
No, No, No. I live in Europe (Germany) and I don’t know a SINGLE PERSON who uses MSN (exclusively), and I have more than 30 people on my buddy list. Why is it that MSN users in Europe always think that when THEY know many people who use MSN, EVERYONE in Europe must use MSN. STOP THAT!
i dont think they are necessarily trying to lock you in, but it would be smart if they did.
i mean they had a windows media player for solaris and even an IE for solaris users. They may still have it somewhere I’m not sure.
I always thought of MSN as an annoyance. I would say #1 AIM #2 Yahoo #3 MSN #4 ICQ.
MSN Messenger does work much better than many jabber clients but i still don’t like it. It’s too much eye-candy for me. I’m a command line guy
IM is starting to (did?) replace email as a primary method of communication on computers. I know when I migrated my GF over to Linux for about a month not having Trillian was one of the things I heard her complain most about.
Also, all my friends used to use ICQ till AOL purchased and killed it. Most my technical frieds moved off Yahoo cause they keep intentionally breaking the protocol so it won’t work with anything but the “official” Yahoo chat. Now most people seem to be on either AIM or MSN.
I’m in Taiwan, and every single person I know uses MSN. Like a previous poster mentioned about some other location, it’s so common here that “I’ll MSN you later” is heard almost daily. I haven’t known anyone that has used ICQ, Yahoo, or AIM clients for about 2-3 years, at least.
Also, every single person I know in Thailand, Malaysia, and Indonesia also uses MSN (although I don’t know that many people in those locations, maybe 30 total).
“There is Gaim, there is Kopete. Are they attractive? No, they aren’t. Their interfaces are terrible.”
that’s a matter of personal preference… i happen to think msn messenger is ugly as hell and gaim looks quite nice…
“Moreover, all you can do with them is write basic IMs. Bye bye overbloated and stupid nudge and Flash sequences.”
good, nudge and flash sequences are annoying and i don’t want to see them anyway.
“File transfers? I can swear that you’re a lucky guy (girl) when it works. Usually it doesn’t, resulting in embarrassing ‘Sorry mate, I’m using Linux, you know and, well, could you mail me this picture instead?’.”
file transfers work just fine for me in gaim…
“And boy are they ugly. Compare a MSN Messenger 7 chat window and a Gaim window. Gaim (or Kopete for that matter) is so austere that the comparison looks unfair even to people who, like me, usually hate themed windows and flashy-for-the- sake-of-being-flashy interfaces.”
i’m not seeing how anyone could think an msn messenger chat window looks good at all…
also, i can’t help noticing how most people complain about not having completely unnecessary features like voice chat and video, but don’t care about essential features like encrypted IMs…
“What happens when the corporation anybody seems to love to hate, namely Microsoft, release a killer app and of makes it free (as in dollars), but, of course, keeps its source jealously closed?”
nothing good.
btw, learn free and profit without the $!
human spirt and community are what we all need.
NOT… “where do you want to go today?”
BUT… “what do you stand for today?”
Quote: “So now its hip to say MSN Messenger is “tied” and “deeply integarated” into the OS? OH PLEASE GIVE ME A BREAK.”
It most probably is, wouldn’t surprise me. It’s funny how Microsoft refuses to make Linux and BSD versions of msn messenger, windows media player and ms office, but it can afford to make versions of this very same software for Mac OS 9 and Mac OS X, both of which have smaller market shares (i’m sure all of the Mac fans will jump up with this comment, but tough, it’s the truth – deal with it). It’s quite plain and simple that Microsoft knows that Linux is a real rival, and that OS X isn’t, and that’s why it’s holding back on what are (unfortunately) key applications still tying people to Microsoft Windows.
Imagine if these applications had Linux versions:
1. Adobe Photoshop
2. Macromedia Dreamweaver
3. Adobe Illustrator
4. Adobe InDesign
5. Microsoft Office
6. Microsoft MSN messenger
7. Microsoft Windows Media Player
Imagine how many people would switch to Linux. Go on. The truth is that a lot of people won’t leave Windows until they see the very same applications on Linux, not just clones, but the “official” applications. The mentality of the average person is that Open Source developers are crap, because they don’t get paid for the job that they do (mostly), and they’re not part of a large corporation. Sad, but true.
The easiest way that the US DOJ could have opened up the market would have been to force Microsoft to port their key apps to Linux and BSD. They have no reasonable argument not to. I think part of the reason why Microsoft got away with it was because it was very evident how deep the hooks for their key applications go into the core operating system – the US DOJ didn’t really want to deliberately sabotage a high income earner for the US government. All this bantying about removing Windows Media Player from the standard install of Windows is a load of crock. It’s not the real root cause of the issue, and sadly, it seems no government wants to touch it.
Dave
I’m living in germany and I don’t know a single person (15-18 y.) who does not use msn messenger. Depends on where you live.
I have tried to convince them to use other messengers, but the nudges and the handwriting finally seems to be more important.
Few people I know use ICQ (usually the computer literates) but they’ll have to switch, too, or otherwise they will not be able to chat properly. And all of the Multi-IMs I tested couldn’t either send files, display avatars or just did not work at all (jabber sucks. really.). Not to mention the new msn features.
Look, I’m certainly not a fan of msn, but it seems to be the best IM out there and it just WORKS. People don’t want to spend hours on their computer to make certain open IM protocols work, they just want to chat.
You do know AOL owns ICQ and AIM and ICQ are actually identical and interoperable on the server side now, right? Only the official clients differ. I haven’t seen either official client in years so I don’t know what they’re like.
BTW, gaim’s MSN file transfer, incoming and outgoing, currently works fine. Most cases where people have problems are caused by firewall issues.
Article and Comment Summary:
A bunch of whining idiots complain about how free software applications are not completely compatible with proprietary applications that use poorly or non-documented protocols.
For those that think that Jabber is a piece of crap, you just showed displayed your ignorance proudly and widely.
Much like email, Jabber does not depend on centralize servers.
Jabber can be used for much more than instant messaging, including inter application communication.
Jabber is secure and chose as the instant messaging app of the Washinton DC police department for its openness, reliability and its ability to encrypt communications from end to end.
Hell, if you need a proprietary apps that works across platforms, use Skype. At least, the Skype folks have taken the trouble to provide the app for every major OS and platform around. And it works easily and sounds like a million bunchs.
I tell you, kids these days…
IM is starting to (did?) replace email as a primary method of communication on computers.
Really? But what kind of communication? Serious stuff, or private chit-chat? Public chit-chat? News? Discussion?
There’s still IRC, Usenet, WWW (Blogs, Fora, CMS). Blogs are relatively pretty new and you have to admit that its a quite popular way of spreading news and public chit-chat.
Some say, including mr Holwerda, that MSN has 100% market penetration, but i say: which market does it have? The private chit-chat market? In regards to AIM, Yahoo!, ICQ it probably has near 100% indeed (in NL) however by saying so you exclude SMS. SMS is IMO an IM protocol and i’d say its a competitor to MSN. A popular one, if i might add.
I agree 100% with the author. They’re doing nothing but adding crap to MSN.
iChat has 8 way audio. MSN has 1 on 1.
iChat will be able to do 4 way video chat this year. MSN will still be stuck at 1 on 1 video chat.
We need products to become more functional MS, not just bring up the annoying features of ICQ (the Ding sound, I don’t remember the shortcut).
I began to use IM when I already was on Linux, so I use MSN a lot (in Italy is 70% about of IM accounts) but I only used Microsoft Messenger for it a bunch of times at work.
On Linux I use Gaim, and everything can be said of Gaim expect it is ugly. Gaim has a clean,cool and easy interface, only bad thing being account preferences etc. distributed a bit at random between menus. I hate the Microsoft interface: THAT is ugly. It seems projected by a trisomic teletubbie.
The writer of the article doesn’t know all what he says: file transfer on MSN actually works damn good with Gaim 1.x (don’t know about Kopete). But surely Gaim still lacks a couple of features, like webcam support, chat backgrounds (yes,it’s a silly feature but people love it) and chat support. Also I don’t have file transfer over ICQ, that’s bad. And management of text effects is quite bad. But things improve impressively: Gaim is one of the few projects where every upgrade seems to be meaningful.
That’s what (still) keeps Gaim behind, not surely the interface. And I think using it on a shiny KDE desktop will calm a lot of eye-candy hunger.
The author is right you know. I agree with you people saying that MSN Messenger is bloated, but that seems to be what people want. In Norway everybody under the age of 40 have MSN Messenger (if they have a computer).
I believe, like the author of the article, that we need a good MSN Messenger clone with support with most of MSN7’s features.
I understand that people say; “Gaim has the basic stuff, it’s what we need”. Yea, many (maybe most?) people that use Linux (for an example) don’t care about nudges, emoticons, webcams an all that. The thing is that most of the people who use MSN Messenger do, and if we want more people to use Linux (for an example) instead of Windows, we need to provide _those_ who want the bloat of MSN Messenger, a fairly good MSN client.
I like Gaim, and I like those other MSN Messenger clients with regular GUI which only do the basics, but I can agree on that it’s fairly annoying when I need to say; “I’m in BeOS, sorry”, when people want to send me a file, use the webcam – whatever.
MSN Messenger is just a _small_ part, but an important part if an OS is to be successful.. It sounds strange, I know, but in Europe, it’s true (I’m not talking about you and me here on OSNews with years of computing behind us, but the young girls and boys which don’t care about the bloated GUI and such)..
Most of my friends use ICQ or IRC but they have more computer knowledge than than average joe, the “other” ppl i know use MSN becouse its installed on almost every windows machine and
public computers are often locked down so you cant install third party apps. I myself use Gaim on linux and Miranda IM on windows.
From where I come and AFAIK, most people have a Y! ID! coupled with pirated Windoze XP! which is pretty sad!
I love the Linux + Skype Combo
I agree with the writer of this article. In Belgium everybody uses MSN messenger. So Microsoft must be doing something right. If we want an OSS IM client to be succesful we have to understand what it is that makes MSN messenger so attractive.
[rant mode on]
Oh my, oh my…
What happened to “use the right tool for the right job”?
If I want to transfer files, I’ll use a _FILE_TRANSFER_PROTOCOL_ (ftp, scp, or maybe http).
If I want to transmit sound, I’ll use a protocol (and software) designed for transmitting sound, such as VoIP via Free World Dialup.
If I want to chat, I’ll use a protocol designed for that.
Side note, I am from Europe as well and _nobody_ I knew on the university used MSN; ICQ is the clear leader here, followed by Jabber. At work, AIM was popular with some departments, now an official client based on Jabber is being deployed. No MSN either. So much for “I use -> all use it” generalizations.
[rant mode off]
Except of specific-protocol clients being more mature (compare any reasonable ftp client to what you have built-in in IM clients), this also give a certain amount of freedom to both communicating parties. I’ll put the file on a ftp server and don’t have to care what client you will use to download it. And when you are going to do it. And whether you are behind a NAT. If I talk to someone via VoIP, I also don’t have to care whether he uses LinPhone, some Windows based SW or a HW Cisco phone. Doing this on the MSN network, we both would have to use the one and only MSN client from Microsoft, on their one and only Windows platform.
Waiting for the MS produced, DRM enabled microphone, which will be the only audio HW allowed to work with MSN
.
The “problem” of IM in linux is the same for the most of all opensource software… the target to the projects is to become alike to the “windows” (saw kopete-msn, openoffice-microsoft office, and so on).In this way linux never grow in desktop – inovate!!!create someting new and usefull that people love( and “windows” don´t have) and ‘voilá’ a winner.
Here in Belgium, MSN is *very* popular indeed. “Being online” is a synonym to “being logged in on your MSN-account”, really. I’m using Gaim on FreeBSD, and 99% of my list is MSN.
I actively try to move people to Firefox and OpenOffice, and sometimes even to Linux/*BSD, but I never try to move anyone to Jabber, as it just is *nothing* of a rival to MSN. MSN (for the Windows people) just works, is very easy, has a lot of “cool features” the young people want etc. Jabber does anyting *I* want, but if people can’t set their “buddy icon” (or what is it called), they won’t use it.
Anyway, I think MSN works pretty good with Gaim (and Gaim is not ugly at all), so it hasn’t been much of a show-stopper for the people I moved to FreeBSD.
The author has hit the head on the nail, he’s so goddamn right. For God’s sake, I am a geek, I love computers, I’m sure many in this site are. But that’s not the majority, folks. If they can’t enjoy (or suffer) flashy interfaces and do everything they do right now, the thought of switching to other OS will never cross their minds, it’s as simple as that.
Of course MSN Messenger is just another way to lock people in to windows, never had a doubt about that. And if things n the distant future get ugly for Microsoft on the desktop, you know, they will enforce the EULA and stop people that ahre now using other platforms to connect to _their_ IM network.
The solution is quite simple. Open Source, multi protocol, IM clients need to be developed that work on both windows and linux, pretty much in the GAIM, KOPETE spirit. I would imagine that much of the code for GAIM and KOPETE could be reused in such an undertaking. Then, if and when people switch, they can still use their “MSN”.
MSN is also very popular in the Netherlands. And I don’t care, I use MSN myself. And I do agree with the author than MSN Messenger is one the the finest pieces of software that MS has ever written, taking in account I am measuring this by their ability to satisfy the needs of their main target audience. Sure, for a LFS/Fluxbox/CLI guy MSN messenger is too bloated, but for teenagers it is close to perfect. It’s so usable (for teens) it could have been written by Apple.
I don’t agree with the author at all when it comes to GAIM. Gaim on NOT ugly. Gaim is just a GTK app and much can be said about GTK, but not that it has ugly widgets (if themed properly, of course, but that also goes for MSN Messenger and Windows in general). Futhermore, GAIM does have flawless file transfers (YES even when NAT’ed/firewalled with NO ports forwarded) and fully supports avatars. So when it comes to GAIM this rant was grey before it was born.
The author is right, many students on my university (i live in Venezuela) don’t switch to linux or mac because msn messenger. They always ask me “Can I use the latest version of msn on your mac?” and when i show them the “latest” official msn messenger version or amsn messenger…… they stick with crapy windows os.
Bashing aside, the guy does have a fair point, although doesn’t particularly know how to put it across well.
I, living in the UK and being pretty young, do use msn all the time and yes we call it msn. Aim yahoo and icq let alone jabber are rather marginalised.
Gaim IMHO is pretty attractive and does support file transfer. Sometimes things work better, allowing the use of aliases to shorten peoples names, using one window and tabs for different people, having there icon appear next to their name in the buddy list. it’s the little things such as webcam support, nudging and voice that have forced me to start using WinXP. Seriously, i’ve been using Ubuntu solidly for 6 months and had to switch over to Win for WEBCAM SUPPORT (and half life 2). V4L completely sucks, i’ve spent hours trying to get the thing to work. Obviously i’m not l337 enough and should write it myself but support for webcams is shocking.
WinXP may have it’s slight inconsistencies but so does Linux, i’ve seen the picture from both sides of the fence and believe that WinXP provides less hassle for a usable desktop. I’ll of course boot into Ubuntu every other day when i don’t want to play games or use the webcam.
> There is Gaim, there is Kopete. Are they attractive? No, they aren’t. Their interfaces are terrible
You sure have not tried Adium for Mac OS X, http://www.adiumx.com/, which happens to be (use) gaim for Mac OS X, have you? It beats bloated MSN hands down with the defaults themes. And you can install your own, if you are not happy.
Someone else pointed about MSN not having spell check… Well, Mac OS’x version does not even have sound/video chat, and about the spell checking, its lack is even more stupid when they could just use the OS spellchecking services, such as the one the helped me correct a pair of thingies in this Safari form. Adium, though, does use them. ^_^
BTW, not a single soul in Spain uses AIM, people does not even know what that acronym is about, have not heard it ever. A pity, since iChat, whatever the opinion on its looks might be (good enough for me) is by far the least obtrusive IM app I’ve used.
I have got to say I agree with the author. I’m an european and everybody here uses MSN (Messenger). I don’t even try another messaging protocol because nobody uses it, over here. That’s a shame really because I’d bet that there are better alternatives. As to the fact of the “inferior” MSN clients, I also agree with him… I can see people skipping linux because of the ‘uglier’ and ‘feature-less’ MSN clients. There really isn’t one good MSN client for linux, and many people, use their computers mainly to chat in MSN with their friends. It’s really popular!
Oh well, it’s just my 2 Euro cents…
Haven’t anyone heard of Miranda IM??
http://www.miranda-im.org
BTW, I’m from Portugal. I’m not saying that it’s the same in every european country but in many countries, including Portugal, MSN is VERY popular.
Haha, the author is dead right about MSN and the ‘normal’ people out there
I’m living in the Netherlands (as you’d probably already guessed) and I hear people talk about it every day, in the trains, schools, cinemas, cafes, etc, etc.
Especially lots of young girls (around the age of 12 – 18) are using MSN Messenger a lot. If you’re looking for a girlfriend via the web in the Netherlands, you’ll need MSN. It’s as simple as that.
Make Gaim be loved and used by women/girls, and the rest of the world will follow, and MSN will be history.
Probably just me. But Gaim is a lot better than MSN *because* of the lack of support for stupid bells and whistles (e.g. flash).
I wonder how google’s IM will look like …
just joking !
or perhabs not ?
Yeah, you are right about that. I don’t care nor want stupid bells and whistles, howhever the mainstream does. They feel it’s cool, and I can understand that. There are things that make people go COOL! and that just makes them like the thing even more!
Moreover I have to say that gaim for MSN isn’t very good… it lacks many features and isn’t very polished in some areas. aMSN is better, howhever it doesn’t feel very polished and it isn’t very snappy…
MSN Messanger has a big holding of the young Israeli IM market – Only that here we simply call it “Messanger”, the MSN is ommited. MSN also have a big community of zealot followers in Israel, who behave like typical Mac zealots (Excitedly discussing rumers, downloading any other beta, etc.).
But recently there is more and more publicity in the media for stuff like Trialian, Miranda and Gaim – Hebrew readers can just look at IM-related related articles (and their comments) on YNet.co.il .
It’s true that MSN is the most popular IM here in europe but imho the last thing linux/*nix needs is focusing on “pretty&slow” gui just to be appealing to joe average who bought his first pc 2 years ago just to play videogames.
Back in the days of win9* i was already hungry about all the bloatware that was running inside my hd and this was the mayor reason to switch to linux.
Speaking of gaim, is already quite big and surely doesn’t need to waste some more ram just to display some fancy graphics.
We need softwares that do their job, nothing more, nothing less.
That is your vision, there are also people who would like Linux to succeed outside the geekworld.
I might be awfully wrong here, so please correct me, but it seems back in 92/93 when I just started to use IM on a Windoze platform, ICQ was the biggest thing and the standard…MSN wasn’t even around. Then the Success of ICQ probably got Microsoft’s attention and they decided to build MSN IM into their system.
I am originally from Taiwan, and admittedly, nowadays a lot of people do use MSN Messenger because it’s just there. My mom probably doesn’t even know it’s called “MSN” or whatever; she knows if she wants to chat with her friends, she just turns on the puter and “click here and there and hey there’re my friends!”
My point is, if it’d been ICQ or Skype that comes with Windoze, that’s what my mom and her friends would be using today.
I am now studying and living in Berlin Germany, and I’d say both Yahoo and MSN messengers are popular here: most of the average users I know have both, and the biggest attraction very possibly being the webcam function.
So I didn’t try to convince them to swtich to GAIM or JABBER, becuase neither the “free as in beer” nor “free as in freedom” argument would be any of their concern.
I’m having a great success with Skype though…people are eager to find ways to voice chat for free. I even converted my mom and dad; we talk all the time on SKype.
Here in portugal it’s the same thing. Msn this, msn that. Some people still use icq, but as for aim and yahoo, forget it. I’ve been trying to get some of my friends to move to jabber w/msn transport, and been having some success.
But for my sister, the only thing that is keeping her from migrating to linux is msn messenger. She uses firefox, word for basic stuff (i.e. you’ll trow in abiword/kword and she won’t notice a thing), winamp and emule. AND msn. I’ve shown her all the im’s i can think of, and the only ones that are getting there, are amsn (amsn.sf.net) and the closest one is mercury (old dmsn — http://www.mercury.to).
The problem with mercury and amsn, is that they are made in java and tcl/tk respectively, and they are SLOW. They crawl doing things msn does fast, so, well, msn is better (as in, incredibly fast for all the crap that it uses and does), especially if you are using it in old pc’s, that don’t have a ton of ram & cpu to spare.
So the author is 100% right, and I think if we had a nice decent, fast, msn look-alike for linux, you would have more changes of migrating lots of people to linux.
Messenger is by far the most widely used IM in France, and due to the ever increasing use of webcams and its closed conferencing protocol, I’m beginning to hear from people that one reason they wouldn’t drop Windows is everybody they know uses Messenger’s video conferencing and you can’t do that without Windows today.
Ok… I don’t wanna start a flame here… but why can’t people write this kind of thing cleary showing that’s their opinion and not some kind of undenyable thuth?! Seriosly… “(…)but, of course, keeps its source *jealously* closed(…)” I’m not for proprietary stuff, but this way of writing just shows me a closed mind or someone with radical politics… Please, we can’t agree with everybody else, but at least let’s respect diferent points of view… If you don’t respect them, who’re you to deserve their respect?
#
Now about the IM discussion… Right now I think that almost everybody “joe user” is switching to msn’s messenger service… why? all this features, bells and so on? well… yeah, but there’s more…
it’s SIMPLE. I mean… it’s really easy to use… IMHO, it really provides a layer of communication beyond the message… much more like talking to the actual person. Do you have to do any configuration to have this experience? Probably not for the joe user, it realy close to the experience you have with a phone let’s say… with a phone you just need to pick it up, dial e wait to talk to the person you want. You can or can not reach your objective, but that’s all you have to do. All to other bells are not necessary, but you can use then if you want and if you can…
hmmm… ok, I’m finishing here for now… ‘head’s blowing, lot of work to do… really bad english inside… yeah, better stop here…
MSN is indeed very popular in the Netherlands too. I think the most important reason for that is that most Dutch people use Hotmail.
Hotmail is very impractical, I think. For example, GMX offers you 1 GB storage and POP access for free. But still, Hotmail is so common for young people that 99% of them write down their address like “kusjes1118@h”.
And then Hotmail is the easiest to use, because you can just sign in with your email address – no need to register or sign up as you would need to do with AIM or ICQ.
On the other hand, where I live in Germany now, about everyone seems to use ICQ.
You are terribly wrong, yes, cos ICQ didn’t exist in 1992 or 1993. I think it started in 95 or 96; when I signed up in 1996 I got a six-digit number, and I don’t think anyone’s got less than five digits (they probably started in the five-digit numbers to make the first few subscribers think it was popular).
I think Yahoo Msgr has all the features (you can “shake” the other user’s window since ages – it’s called buzz) with Voice, Cam, Flash and so on, and it is not from Microsoft. There is even an old Linux version, maybe they’ll update it some time. So, I really think Yahoo is almost the same as MSN Messenger, but morally better because its not from MS
What do you think?
You’re right, how stupid of me!! *embarrassed* It is around 95/96 that I started using ICQ…or maybe even later, since I got an 8-digit number!
Hehe Minghan, i got a 7 digit ICQ number 🙂
i have been using ICQ and skype on windows for years (kopete and skype in SUSE), resolutely refusing to install or have anything to do with MSN, but recently that changed.
my brother went to Hull university where he found that MSN was the only IM protocol they allowed through the campus firewall. so i installed MSN. i tried to set up Trillian for MSN but maybe i am too much of a tard, cos i couldn’t get it to work.
Very good article, really. MSN is extremly popular here in Europe, I know just 2-3 “geeks” who _also_ have ICQ, (though they of course have MSN too), and basicly _nobody_ with AIM.
And MSN is one of the apps (the other one is Word) that makes me not to delete my Win-installation. (I still use MS Word since the OO.org’s swedish dictionary is really terrible and can not be compared in any sense with MS’, unfortunately).
I’m not saying Kopete needs nudge-feature, but a good file transfer and (most important) webcam support is really missing. Nobody’s using NetMeeting today, so GnomeMeeting’s capability to connect to such protocol is really useless nowadays. We need a better V4L2-implementation/integration with the IM-apps!
It’s true that MSN Messenger has a lot more cool features than most used open IM clients have by default, but I should say that things are changing fast.
– Amsn has support even for tha nudge plugin
– Gaim-vv already have support for video and voice!
– Kopete has a plugin which connects with video-voice applications (you can now select whch, so that it can be Gnomemeeting, or the other of KDE whose name I don’t remember…)
– I don’t know about games support, but there must be something somewhere. Many clients (amsn, gaim, kopete) support plugins, and there must be that kind of plugin.
What I feel is that jabber is getting no priority. I’d like to see it to support video and voice, and a good client with plugin support wich centrates in developing a featureful jabber support with everything need: also remote assistance et all ! (hey, in kopete I cannot even send formated messages via jabber :-P)
But anyways, I can tell you that if you want, you can do all of that- the only problem is that it’s not integrated in one app, but that is being solved.
So now its hip to say MSN Messenger is “tied” and “deeply integarated” into the OS? OH PLEASE GIVE ME A BREAK.
Last time I had a Windows XP install, I could NOT remove the horrid Messenger without going through much rigamarole. If you can’t easily remove something, I would call it pretty “deeply tied”.
Never used MSN, just ICQ and can’t imagine something to be much better than Miranda.. I don’t want to touch poorly written bloated software and that applies to just about all MS software I’ve used.
I agree with author. M$ did the same (embed in Windows) with Internet Explorer (result: Netscape died), with Windows Media Player (Real and others are dying) and now with Messenger.
The strategy is the same: first make a clone (not better, only working the sufficient) from the best product on same category, then makes it available as free download, at last put it embedded in windows and kill competition.
Normal people are stupid and lazy to use any alternative not included with windows.
If M$ can make an componentized Windows XP embedded, who lets install only what you want, why not impose MS to sell the same for common users ? Someone must stop M$…
Sure i hope that linux will succeed outside the “geekworld” but i also think that is important to educate new computers users.
They should learn that fancy animations&co slow down the computer for no reason and this is one of the reason why any new software release under win32 is often slower than the previous.
If instead we give them all the bloatware they like just to make them say “ohh this is cool!”
i fear that they will never learn how to choose the right software for their needs..and in the long term users who prefer performance over style will be forced to use apps they don’t like because nearly everything will have 3D gui and stuff like that
You’re dead on!
For a long time I just could not believe how preinstalled software should matter at all since I was always installing my own preferred applications anyway. But once I saw how technically-handicapped people get completely lost when the icon they want to click suddenly just isn’t there, I realized what “average user” really means.
All the people bashing the article really really really miss the point. The article has a VERY valid point.
And the sad truth really is that most opensource GUI apps just suck. Bad.
>So now its hip to say MSN Messenger is “tied” and “deeply >integarated” into the OS? OH PLEASE GIVE ME A BREAK.
Where did the article say that???? It was saying that here is an application which people like to use that is not available for anything other than windows.
“What happens when the corporation anybody seems to love to hate, namely Microsoft, release a killer app and of makes it free (as in dollars), but, of course, keeps its source jealously closed?”
WTF?
iChat is a killer app. Not MSN Messenger.
> What happens when the corporation … release a killer app and of makes it free (as in dollars), but, of course, keeps its source jealously closed?
Competitors can not steal (cut-n-paste) work of many software developers, testers, usablility specialists, documentation writers paid by the corporation. Instead, competitors are forced to come with their own product, investing their own money and time into it, 100%.
While this type of relationship will look silly and plain wrong in the future ideal world where people work for common good and not for money, in the world where we live it is called competitive advantage.
In the future world of people free of pursuing material gains, the whole idea of multiple independent groups of people wasting their time working on duplicate products will be laughed at. In our current world it is called competition.
Also, the trend of giving free Internet software large scale started with Netscape. While officially they sold Navigator, you could always download free version from their Web site.
That did not stop Netscape from achieving spectacular success with their IPO, making many company employees stinky rich. This is an example when market forces give credit to silly ideas of giving away software for free.
Keeping Netscape sources guarded at that time prevented competitors from just copying them, and forced other companies to come with their own products, including Internet Explorer and Opera.
And worse than that, use it to maintain a strong lock-in to the Windows platform?
Worse for whom? The worse is when you have a good enough OS you want to sell to the public- or sell services based on that OS to the public, but no applications to keep people on that OS. After all, only small percent of users chooses desktop OS on its technical merits, most look for applications. Not so for server OS, where technical merits rule.
I know that, you know that, Microsoft knows that, Linux developers know that, OS X developers know that. Everyone knows that. Not everyone acts.
It is like saying that if car dealership offers me free oil change for 5 years if I buy their new car, it is worse. Worse for whom? For me? No- I have a car and an oil change. For dealer? No- they sold me a car. For their lazy inept competitors: truly YES.
Worse as in a case when your friend bought a car and the dealer added for no extra cost the imaginary CatFur(tm) interior. Your friend used to give you a ride to office. He still would, but you happen to be allergic to cats. Too bad for you.
“”But you cant deny that we dont have a free IM for Linux which can
a) Voice Chat
b) Deply the Webcam
c) File Transfer Without Errors
d) Look great!””
AYTTM actually does allow two-way webcam broadcasting via Yahoo.
http://ayttm.sourceforge.net
The kind that lights a bulb in people’s mind
Yahoo Messenger has been able to do all of these things and more for years. And they have versions for Mac, Linux, and FreeBSD as well as a Web client.
MSN Messenger in Poland is pretty much nonexistent. I don’t know anyone who uses it – more, I don’t know anyone who knows someone who uses MSN Messenger
IM market here is dominated by 3 Polish IMs: Gadu Gadu, Tlen and WP Contact. They sum up to nearly 100% of market share (counting also other IMs but using plugins for those protocols).
Some people use other, non-polish IMs but only as secondary means.
You can blame MSN all you want, but it has had videoconference for _ages_, and the winks stuff is stupid but people like it.
I don’t see such innovations in jabber or open source clients, sorry.BTW, the “animations” in msn 7.0 beta are flash(.swf) so it should be not hard to implement them.
Miranda-IM’s ( http://www.miranda-im.org/ ) interface blows Trillian/Gaim/Kopete’s bloated crap out of the water. Too bad it’s win32-only. In *nix I’m stuck with naim, an ncurses client with decent AIM/ICQ support.
What the hell? Are you people still using Gaim .52?
Last time I had a Windows XP install, I could NOT remove the horrid Messenger without going through much rigamarole. If you can’t easily remove something, I would call it pretty “deeply tied”.
it has, you know, a uninstaller. The default which XP installs is broken, yes (you can blame microsoft for that if you want). But it’s not “tied”. It’s “installed” and the uninstaller is “failing”, there’s only “deep tying” in your mind
There reason why i like Kopete and Gaim is because they have such a nice clean interface. I hope this will stay this why.
Windows is a bad example of a good GUI. KDE and Gnome get a lot better! I hope their interfaces keep clean.
Sorry, my English is not so good to understand your car analogy.
I was lost when you said that imaginary product could cause real allergy.
Also, if product is not imaginary, and I was leeching on a good will of my friend to give me a ride, it is my and my freeloader problem only if his new car can’t be used by me.
Finally, are you sure my friend didn’t do it intentionally, to get rid of a freeloader- but politely.
Here is another car analogy for you, a better one. You can buy a car with 3 years warranty (industry standard) or with 5 years warranty and 5 years free oil change.
It would be silly to demand from the car manufacturer who offers 5 years warranty and free oil change to extend this offering to cars from his competitors.
It would be stupid to blame that car manufacturer for going an extra mile to attract customers to his cars.
It would be plain moronic to say that it is bad for customer.
It would be right, if you wish to, demand other car manufacturers follow the suit and provide extra warranty plus free oil change- giving credit to one which does it already.
In Latin America 90% of the IM users use MSN.
“There reason why i like Kopete and Gaim is because they have such a nice clean interface. I hope this will stay this why.
Windows is a bad example of a good GUI. KDE and Gnome get a lot better! I hope their interfaces keep clean.”
Exactly. Gaim has an EXTREMELY clean interface.