Google Hires Gaim's Main Developer

astrab writes "According to Dirson's blog, Google's just hired Sean Egan (the main developer of Gaim open IM client), just the same day Yahoo! and Microsoft plan to link their respective proprietary IM networks." From the post: "While Yahoo! and Microsoft link their proprietary networks for Instant Messaging, Google bets on Open Protocols to make information universally accessible ... Currently, Google uses XMPP/Jabber specs, but they claim to be supporting open server-to-server federation, and work "to hear from other people in the communications industry about how best to build a federation model that is open, scalable". In fact, there are this month several tests with firms like EarthLink, Sipphone or PeopleCall. "

iChat

Very neat, glad to see google is committed to cross-platform support.

I will be happy when gtalk works with my jabber account in iChat.

Looks like

they've GAIMed another employee!

Re:Looks like

Our loss is their gaim.

Re:Looks like

Sheesh. This is a serious topic and you clowns are just playing GAIMs.

Re:Looks like

I think this thread is getting a bit gaim-y....

Re:Looks like

"Our loss is their gaim."

IM sick of people msn around with these stupid puns. If anybody here is actually funny, I seek you.

Jobs in OSS

Just another example of where an OSS junkie finds gainful employment in the dot-com industry.

Hired a month and a half back

According to this [sourceforge.net] page on the Gaim site, he's been working at google for a month and a half now:

Working at Google

I (Sean) have been hired by Google, moved to Seattle, and have been working on the Google Talk team for about a month and a half. The goal of Google Talk is to make real-time communication as open as possible, and in that regard, I've been working to offer all of Google Talk's features into other clients. Currently, I'm working on making it as easy as possible for other clients to use Google Talk's voice features. You can expect Gaim and other clients to be interoperable with Google Talk's voice features in the near future.

Re:Burn me down!!!

I was the second team member on a very popular linux distro ... I also make a very decent salary writing windows software. Does this mean I'm sold out to the man? Or does it mean I need to eat and buy my family food and shelter?

Or am I supposed to donate all of myself, and my families welfare for your ideals? Look at the founder of Gentoo, Daniel Robbins ... The guy stepped down when he was 40k in DEBT living his ideals.

Could it also be that the way to chang the system is to work inside it? I have influence over products, IT, and software decisions from this position I wouldn't have mooching off my folks and writing OSS software in the basement.

Webcam

This would be great if it somehow sped up development of webcam support in Gaim in Linux. Or even webcam support in some new Goolge IM client for Linux. Asking people to use netmeeting is sortof a pain especially if they are behind firewalls.

Re:Webcam

Why would I want to see a bunch of people online and talk with them when they could just send me a text message? I can save a history of text chat. I can go take a dump and come back and catch up on the text I missed. I don't have to look at ths person. I dont' have to deal with a bunch of overhead. Video is just a stupid addition to so many things these days (such as blogs).

Video is NOT always an improvement.

Re:Webcam

bcus my dad cant splel werth crp

Re:Webcam

Setting aside the corporate necessities for video conferencing; video over IM clients is a great way for families to interact when members are a great distance away. Text and voice is good to a point, but getting to actually SEE your loved ones (in a non-static picture) fulfills a deeper need. I'm sure a psychologist could better explain that than I could.

The fact that, in your opinion, video is a "stupid addition" is absolutely irrelevant in today's society.

Different methods

It's interesting that MSN and Yahoo IM clients are working together to get in on the pie that AOL currently has half of through text chat. Meanwhile, it looks like Google wants to make sure everyone can talk to everyone in hopes that this will attract more people than regular IM, methinks. Afterall, why bother with IM, when Google will have a veritable VoIP service for free ( I know it's not the same, but it could be quite similar ) that plays with others? The only pitfall to this tactic is that you can IM someone a dirty little sercret at work, but VoIP'ing it can get you into serious trouble ^_^

The most popular IM client?

TFA says, "Sean is the main developer of Gaim, the most popular IM client." I somehow doubt that. MSN Messenger is preinstalled on just about every news Windows box. Plus, the standard AIM client has been around for a very long time.

Re:The most popular IM client?

Just because a piece of software comes preinstalled doesnt mean it is popular. Assuming that a virus infects everyones computer, does it become the most popular piece of software ?

Oh great

I think he was like, the last person who didn't work for Google. I'm pretty sure I work for Google now too. Anybody here not work for Google?

Re:Oh great

I don't work for Google.. but if they need me, I currently need a job. You hear that Google?

Some fun with puns

Shouldn't this be titled "Google Got GAIM?" I'm all for the GAIM marriage thing--it will only help Google Kopete against Microsoft-- but the next thing you know, Google will be saying "Send in the GIMP." What kind of Subversion of moral authority would that be?

Open up the inter-server links, Google.

Google need to play the good guys, and open up their Talk servers so that other Jabber servers can connect with them. Until they do this, I'm going to be a little suspicious of them. (I do use my Google Jabber account, but I still keep my other ones too, as I'm not sure of their motives.) Still, good on Google for using an open protocol - I've been trying to explain to people why Jabber is good ("imagine if there were only 4-5 email servers in the world, and you could only email users of your email server") for a long time - and it's been a thankless task.

Re:Open up the inter-server links, Google.

I've seen a couple of places where people claiming to have spoken with people inside google stated that Google fully intends to enable server to server communication with other jabber servers, but they are still working on the implementation. Of course, this is all hearsay, but it makes sense. Given the scale they are looking at, I would imagine that Google didn't just grab a random existing open source jabber server. They would have written their own in house specifically to meet their needs.

Re:Open up the inter-server links, Google.

From their help pages Federation with google talk [google.com]

We plan to support open server-to-server federation. We do believe, however, that it is important to have the safeguards in place to ensure that we maintain a safe and reliable service that protects user privacy and blocks spam and other abuses.

So hang in there and it will happen. In the meantime I guess you could email them if you were really anxious: federation at google.com

So what you're saying is...

...Google aims to maim AIM as it gains GAIM's main brain?

Re:So what you're saying is...

Not to flame, but rhyming is lame.

They're getting into soda pop now?

But I must admin, Google Hires rootbeer has a certain ring to it.

a bad day

another loss to the open source community, this gaim developer now will be too busy in meetings, 20% free time and other google things. the gaim developement will stall.

Re:a bad day

"another loss to the open source community, this gaim developer now will be too busy in meetings, 20% free time and other google things. the gaim developement will stall."

Are you seriously crying over the fact that the guy will now have more than enough drachmas to buy himself food now? If anything, his hiring by Google ensures that he'll be working on Gaim even more now.

Has Firefox stalled with Google hiring some coders? Sheesh, its not like Microsoft hired Linus all of a sudden.

Open Source Client versus Open Source Server?

So basically we're going back to the days of IRC, albeit in a different front-end format.

It does sound good, in some ways, but I worry about rogue servers and rogue clients. IM has been virtually free of direct spam attacks (I have only received one in my entire life), and I fear that without having some corporation's control in their propietary medium, we'll see more spam and less usefulness.

Look what happened with the "open standard" of Usenet. It is SO informative and so readily useful, isn't it? I'm not a fan of most Yahoo Groups but the ones I read are generally spam free (moderators) instead of being spam magnets.

Yes, there is a place for open source, but I don't think this is it. I'm willing to hear reasons why Google's desire to have a open server-to-server federation will be good for a product that already offers me everything I need (at the moment). What new features are going to replace the current text-to-text feature that is probably used by 100% of IM's users. Is VoIP really an extension to IM or is it a different product? Aren't there enough programmers added on features to the propietary AIM program that is doesn't seem to warrant the need for a more open standard? Does the propietary standard offer manufacturers more reason to police their networks of abusers, and is it wrong for these companies to assume to make a profit in order to pay for the massive infrastructure needed to provide IM services?

I do understand the need to open the standard for client-server interaction. More clients means more features, more stability, and more control over your applications on your computer. It also means more clients for lesser-used operating systems, better integration into non-PC stations (media centers, phones, etc), and possibly more people using the IM system.

Re:Open Source Client versus Open Source Server?

Yes, there is a place for open source, but I don't think this is it. I'm willing to hear reasons why Google's desire to have a open server-to-server federation will be good for a product that already offers me everything I need (at the moment).

Scenario: I run a small business and I want to be able to run an internal server that lets my employees chat and video chat with one another and transfer files in a secure, encrypted fashion. Due to security concerns and government regulations I can't use someone else's server. Further I would like to enable my employees to chat with people in other companies and with anyone else they feel like either through a mostly secure, encrypted messaging system or an unencrypted messaging system. I'd like users to be able to choose the client that suits them and that runs on any given platform. Finally, I don't want to poke a half a dozen holes in my firewall and I don't want every user to have to run five different accounts to talk to all the different people they know.

The proper answer to this problem is for the industry to move to an open standard. It works just fine for e-mail, and there is no reason it won't work for chat.

Don't be Tom Smykowski

Before everyone assumes everything with Gaim will be instantly different, remember that a couple Firefox developers got hired by Google, and nothing much changed with that project. I mean, Microsoft hired the founder of Gentoo, and look how much has changed there (practically nil).

In short, if anything this is good because ensures that Gaim will not die. Google hired a dev, they didn't somehow buy the whole project.

Linux is not their first priority

Everyone's first thought is probably that this will be great for Gaim. But how much time will Sean have for Gaim if he's working on Google Talk? It's more likely that Google is interested in him because of libgaim, which runs on Windows and supports all the major protocols. Between AIM, MSN and Yahoo on Windows, that's a huge majority of the market. I doubt Gaim on Linux is why they want Sean.

Scary misread!

I nearly shat myself when I first read the headline. I thought it read:

Google Hires GAIN's Main Developer

Jabber + PostgreSQL == good

I've been using xdb_sql to log user registrations and roster changes and whatnot to PostgreSQL; notes on that are here [blogs.com].

The more Jabber developers and users the better... it'll just keep getting faster and more stable!

so...

... who from the gain developer community will throw a chair and scream that they'll kill google?

Get in the GAIM

I hear Google is hiring.
Anyone got some innovative web apps to develop?

Contact information:
http://www.google.com/intl/en/jobs/index.html [google.com]

Google Benefits

We have never forgotten since our start-up days that great things happen more frequently within the right culture and environment. So we offer Googlers a generous host of benefits as part of our efforts to keep Google a motivating, healthy, and productive place.

Among the various benefits many Googlers enjoy:
* Health care for you and your family, plus on-site physician and dental care at our headquarters in Mountain View, California
* Vacation days and holidays, and flexible work hours
* Maternity and parental leave, plus new moms and dads are able to expense up to $500 for take-out meals during the first four weeks that they are home with their new baby
* Employee referral bonus program
* Employee assistance services for personal issues, childcare referrals, answers to financial and legal questions
* Learning opportunities and tuition reimbursement
* Adoption assistance
* Google Child Care Center, just five minutes from Google headquarters in Mountain View
* Back-up child care helps California parents when their regularly scheduled child care falls through
* Free shuttle service to several San Francisco, East Bay, and South Bay locations
* Fuel Efficiency Vehicle Incentive Program
* Employee discounts
* Onsite dry cleaning, plus a coin-free laundry room in the Mountain View office

Look for us to continue exploring novel ideas in benefits, compensation, and culture. Our goal is to build a company characterized not only by success and innovation, but also by the highest levels of integrity and fairness in our dealings with one another.

Why can't all companies be like Google??? The world would be a better place.

Re:Get in the GAIM

Try reading that again, except substituting this at the end:

Why can't all *countries* be like Google??? The world would be a better place.

Interesting times ahead - Comcast, Google, AOL

There are so many ways these three companies can benefit each other. Comcast could provide the AOL software as its own front end to the internet. "Hey, look how easy it is to use Comcast Cable as opposed to Verizon DSL!" This would reduce the number of people who drop AOL because they have to pay for a broadband service on top of AOL to get AOL on broadband. "Now I can get AOL and a high speed connection for one price!" Non-broadband users could still subscribe to AOL dial-up if they wish. "Broadband costs too much, I want to stay with dial-up." AOL could provide the massive userbase Google needs to make its potential Office software suite popular. AOL software could be the distribution channel for a Google Office product that comes installed with AOL, rather than supplying the Office apps as a purely internet-based application. "Check out this Google Word Processor and Spreadsheet application, it just came with my new version of AOL!" Google gains more advertising revenue because now it can be the default search engine and office application for AOL and Comcast users.

Sounds exactly like Google

I mean, just when everybody start thinking they've finally became just another big evil corporation, they go out there and do something good. And then everybody's confused again.

Google sells real Information Technology?

It seems to me that Google, contrary to other IT companies, actually sees its business as providing access to information, whereas companies like MS and AOL seek vendor lock-in for their file formats and protocols.

Some of you may have already realized this, but for me, I had this realization while reading this article summary. Google is like the first real IT company -- this is what the computer revolution was meant to be.

Gaim posted this news yesterday

This was posted on the gaim.sf.net front page [sourceforge.net] yesterday:

I (Sean) have been hired by Google, moved to Seattle, and have been working on the Google Talk team for about a month and a half. The goal of Google Talk is to make real-time communication as open as possible, and in that regard, I've been working to offer all of Google Talk's features into other clients. Currently, I'm working on making it as easy as possible for other clients to use Google Talk's voice features. You can expect Gaim and other clients to be interoperable with Google Talk's voice features in the near future.

That sound you just heard......

...... was a chair hitting a wall in Redmond Washington.

IRC?

86 comments and one mention of IRC. Why are they trying to re-invent the wheel? They want open, anh scalable? There it is, IRC. Why not concentrate time on things like video connection, picture sharing, and other fluffy stuff you get in the private IM clients. DCC is there, can't be hard. All it needs is a shift to an "on-line/off-line" style, which could be as easy as logging on to a special channel. This sort of stuff could be built in without breaking previous versions of the protocol.

I hired him before

Well, sort of, and for free:

I installed GoogleTalk on the first day, but it kept crashing.

So I set up Gaim to use my Google account, and never started GT again.

I can sure undesrtand why Google would need someone from Gaim.

( Besides, since it's also Gsomething, they had to )

open source pays

Who said open source doesn't pay? This is just another evidence that it pays to participate in the open source community, and to contribute code and knowledge.

Am I psychic or what?

Google The Messenger of the Future(Score:1) by thexgodfather (880849) on Wednesday October 12, @07:07PM (#13778643) http://www.google.com/talk/ [google.com] [google.com]

Still needs a lot of work but the way google is spending money it will get the attention it needs soon.

I wouldn't be surprised if google talk spawns itself from gaim since it refrences gaim on its homepage. Anyone know how the legalities would work out of google talk kidnapped all of its code from gaim? lol
Clik here to see post [slashdot.org]

in other google hiring news

This is a little offtopic, but it is probably the most relevant article that I can post it in.

Google is looking for Mac developers [blogspot.com]. Signs of more cross platform software coming from the Googleplex?

in other google hiring news

This is a little offtopic, but it is probably the most relevant article that I can post it in.

Google is looking for Mac developers [blogspot.com]. Signs of more cross platform software coming from the Googleplex?

im ready for google linux

maybe they can take some of that cash, and find away to support all hardware drivers, etc, that would be nice, make a linux distro

federation model?

What the heck is that? Something StarTrek related? :)

Hmm Schmidt knows how to

the dirty gaim!

What's a main developer?

With modern repositories, revision controls, and search engines it's hard to have a main developer. Everyone can contribute just as much as everyone else and know as much. This is the same problem Google had when it was VA I.O.U.. They hired the most well known programmers assuming there was a difference in knowledge level only to get nothing and watch development get done elsewhere.

Expect Google Talk

for Linux real soon :)

This is an amazing app under windows (so far fingers crossed), in fact, Google Talk is the only reason I have a windows box running at this site. Skype wishes it was google talk.

Why I hate gaim.

I'll be at work, working away, when a remote server goes down.

gaim opens a window saying so, in effect saying "fuck you" to me. My concentration apparently isn't important.

gaim opens another window showing a reconnecting progress bar. Fuck you again.

That might fail, so it opens still more windows. Fuck you!

Eventually it succeeds. And gaim opens a window showing my buddy list. FUCK YOU!

Jesus H Christ! Does a single person in the world think this is helpful?

(And, for what it's worth, I have it on good account that its internals aren't pretty either.)

this makes me doubt google's wisdom

i use to try to submit patches to GAIM. the guy not only did not accept the patches, he didn't even reply to me in any way whatsoever.

the code was a mess. complete and utter spaghetti.
and furthermore, the whole heavy lifting of interoperability depends on a library that the GAIM author didn't write. GAIM is simply a shoddy GUI on top of a hacked library that violates AOL's license agreement by its very existence.

i really have to wonder about the google people. did they even look at this code? did they even test the program to see how unusable and ugly it is? what kind of process did they go through when hiring this guy? id sell my stock now if i were a money man.

Where AIM, Google Talk, MSN and Yahoo! IM fit in

After what seems like an eternity, the IM world is gradually inching towards interoperability. Yahoo! & Microsoft have rea