It was the late 90s, social media platforms like Facebook didn't yet exist, texting was in its infancy, email was very popular, instant messaging was up for...

The bottom of the article links to the history (individual features) of other IM programs from that era as well like ICQ and Yahoo Messenger.

  • tiasEnglish
    16·
    3 hours ago

    And then Jabber came to fix it by introducing an open protocol, and Google started supporting it, and all was well. But when everybody was using Google Chat they severed the Jabber compatibility, locking everyone in to their platform. Now we’re back wading around in enshittified shit and Jabber is dead.

    • TarantulaFudge@startrek.websiteEnglish
      3·
      53 minutes ago

      Support matrix!! It already has international support, just needs to be a bit better with stickers and qol stuff. I’ve been using it for years. It’s nice to know I don’t have to worry about my privacy at all with chat rooms that can continue on without the original server.

      • tiasEnglish
        1·
        36 minutes ago

        It was promoted to me as a contender for Slack / IRC, not for the kind of direct messaging app that ICQ / MSN messenger was.

    • curbstickle@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
      2·
      2 hours ago

      I wouldn’t say jabber is dead, xmpp is still pretty well used. Not enough IMO, but still in use and with readily available modern servers. Jitsi is xmpp+jingle (sip signalling) after all.