Oh AIM — How Do I Respect Thee?

I was playing around with AIM clients this morning.AIM and buddy lists and instant messaging were pioneered by AOL more than a dozen years ago. Here is a link to the AIM page.

AIM really started the concept of viral marketing.We never spent a penny in its launch to get it out to consumers.

AIM was the first viral marketing hit on the web;

AIM really started the concept of social networking. It was the original Facebook;

AIM really started the concept of real time status updates; hello Twitter?;

AIM really started the concept of widgets — a nice little polite piece of code that was super- imposed on your pages to create a direct connect with other people;

AIM really started the concept of a friends and family networking list — such as Linkedin;

AIM really started the concept of measuring your direct online 6 degrees of separation network — check out AIMfight.com;

AIM really was a precursor to texting — wasn’t it?

AIM was really a precursor to the “alive and always on” web;

AIM was first to build in voice apps to a web client;

And on and on.

AIM is one of the greatest web products ever created.

To that original team that worked on its creation and launch — wow — I salute you! To the people working on AIM now — you have a big responsibility — keep the client light — efficient — ditch the ads that get in the way of convenience and utility — respect the past — innovate to the future.

AIM is a utility product and one I use every single day.

0 thoughts on “Oh AIM — How Do I Respect Thee?”

I also used AIM everyday, Ted. But that was 6 years ago. Somewhere along the line (I guess it was when I moved from one company to another) the daily AIM fix became less important. Long before Skype, AIM was the preferred choice within many international companies as as quick means of communication. In perfect and crystal clear hindsight, one could always argue that AIM was everything and still is.
My take is that the AIM development team somewhere along the lines stopped to be in front and lead innovation. They became followers. Yet, technologies like Skype (peer-to-peer rights fight with founders) can be beaten. AIM 7 could become a great product, with a few simple steps. One suggestion: Introduce SIP and powerful Firewall/NAT traversal that actually works. Get it from the pioneers like ex-Ericsson IP core team at Paradial. Then AIM will avoid messages on Junipers site like this: TITLE: AOL INSTANT MESSENGER SIP INVITE MESSAGE DENIAL OF SERVICE VULNERABILITY. AIM high!

Chris Testman on September 25, 2009 at 3:55 AM said:

I also used AIM everyday, Ted. But that was 6 years ago. Somewhere along the line (I guess it was when I moved from one company to another) the daily AIM fix became less important. Long before Skype, AIM was the preferred choice within many international companies as as quick means of communication. In perfect and crystal clear hindsight, one could always argue that AIM was everything and still is.
My take is that the AIM development team somewhere along the lines stopped to be in front and lead innovation. They became followers. Yet, technologies like Skype (peer-to-peer rights fight with founders) can be beaten. AIM 7 could become a great product, with a few simple steps. One suggestion: Introduce SIP and powerful Firewall/NAT traversal that actually works. Get it from the pioneers like ex-Ericsson IP core team at Paradial. Then AIM will avoid messages on Junipers site like this: TITLE: AOL INSTANT MESSENGER SIP INVITE MESSAGE DENIAL OF SERVICE VULNERABILITY. AIM high!