The BugEyed Review Blog

So yesterday I found Google’s Google Talk app. Downloaded it (along with the new Google Desktop), and installed. The two interface very nicely together, Google Talk becoming a panel in Google Desktop [googleblog.blogspot.com].

I already had Skype installed and running (With the Pamela voicemail app to take free voicemail.), so I decided to compare Google Talk with Skype.

First impression? I’m not impressed. Google Talk had a very obvious “International Phonecall” feel to it, with a two second-or-so latency, even though we are on the same ADSL network and 15km from eachother. Also, when comparing it to Skype in terms of quality, Skype’s quality just seemed more superior than Google’s, more crips, louder, clearer.

Google Talk is a brilliant concept, and its release was timed perfectly. However, I think Google needs to do a bit more work on getting the call quality up and the latency down, before it will become a viable competitor to the likes of Skype or VoipBuster.

Google Talk also seems to be lacking in the feature department. The great thing is that its Instant Messaging is based on the Jabber chat protocol [wikipedia.org], which makes it nice and open and gives you the ability to connect to the Google Talk server using any Jabber enabled IM client (such as Gaim [wikipedia.org] or Trillian [wikipedia.org]). What it’s missing is the ability to break out of the Google server onto land or cellphone lines, which I’m sure is in development right now, and I look forward to it. Another great thing that Google has there is the fact that you use your GMail account to authenticate to the server, which just adds to the value of GMail accounts. There’s also now talk that Gmail is about to become a non-invite-only sign-up-if-you-don’t-have-one system, see the Google Blog entry here [googleblog.blogspot.com].

I’ll be running both Skype and Google Talk (The two seem to be able to work just fine when running at the same time, I’m not sure what happens when you get a Skype call when you’re already in a Google Talk call. Heh.), and will definitely be keeping an eye on Google Talk’s development. Google has yet another goldmine there, and I think with the next version it’s bound to become a very viable alternative to the other more mature VOIP services out there.

Google Talk’s release was all over a lot of news sources yesterday, so I gathered some links about it here:

• Google poised to unveil new messaging system [iol.co.za]
• Google gets everyone talking [iol.co.za]
• Google Talk takes a bow [news24.com]
• Google gets to talking [GoogleBlog]
• Google Talk Far From Superior [cbsnews.com]
• Google Talk (Beta) [pcmag.com]
• Google Talk lives… [zdnet.com]
• Google News Search on “Google Talk” [news.google.com]