While messaging is commonplace today, it was only two decades ago that chatting with friends and strangers online was a revolutionary concept.
It pays homage to the advancements made in the early days by apps such as ICQ or AIM, while also looking at the trends in IM that will surface in the coming years. The following infographic from Hello Pal, a messaging app allowing for instant translation, shows the evolution of instant messaging. Instant Messaging: Past, Present, and Future However, despite the impressive features of dominant apps like Snapchat, Facebook Messenger, and Whatsapp, today’s technology would simply not be possible without the earlier breakthroughs of their more rudimentary predecessors. The present IM experience is seamless, and it intuitively integrates features like video, photos, voice, e-commerce, and gaming with plain-old messaging. Since then, instant messaging has revolutionized how we communicate, and today over 2.5 billion people are signed up for at least one messaging app. ICQ introduced server-based contact lists with the release of version 2001b earlier this year, in effect freeing its members from the desktop by storing address books and other data on central computers maintained by the company.The concept of instant messaging crossed into the mainstream in the 1990s, allowing friends, acquaintances, colleagues, and like-minded thinkers from all over the world to connect in real-time.
The new ICQ releases come as competing instant messaging services from Microsoft and Yahoo introduce bells and whistles such as videoconferencing in a bid to overtake AOL's lead in a fast-growing market.īy contrast, AOL has avoided loading on new IM features, concentrating instead on making its products more mobile under its "AOL Anywhere" and lesser-known "ICQ Anywhere" slogans. The product has since been upgraded and renamed AIM Express. AOL launched a Web-based version of its AOL Instant Messenger, called AIM Quick Buddy, nearly two years ago. This is not AOL Time Warner's first Web-based IM service. "The new versions of ICQ make it even easier and more convenient for users to stay in touch in real time from wherever they are and in a variety of different ways," Jim Bankoff, president of AOL Web properties, said in a statement.
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