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AOL to Replace AIM with Triton
An anonymous reader writes "BetaNews is reporting that AOL has begun beta testing a replacement for its AOL Instant Messenger (AIM) software. Triton has an entirely new user interface that adds highly anticipated features including tabbed messaging and logging. The client will also be open to third party plug-ins." From the article: "It is no coincidence that AOL is fielding so many betas concurrently. AOL Browser, an Internet Explorer based Web browser; AOL Media Player, a standalone audio and video player; AOL search technologies and AOL's synchronization utilities are all part of what was once a unified communications client called Fanfare."
Sounds familiar
It is worth noting that this is still an early beta.
I installed it this morning and had frequent crashes so I switched back to the regular 5.9 version.
Here's a select quote from the betanews forums:
"Why is it that so many small or independent developers give us so much quality software, often without reward, and huge companies like AOL can only spit out this bloated garbage?"
I have often regretted my speech, never my silence.
-Xenocrates
Just as a clarification, this is *not* a new protocol. This is a new client that integrates the AIM protocol and functionality with other services.
There's no tabbed messaging
Tabbed messaging has been in Trillian since 2.0. See here.
you still have to have an account with each service you want to use
For at least a couple of the services, you can do this right through Trillian (for the others, it loads up a web page just like the official client does). I don't see how this is any different than what you'd do with an official client.
Trillian is basically just an IM client aggregator- it doesn't provide any messaging capabilities itself
Well, being an IM client aggregator pretty much makes it a killer app in itself (yes, I know there are others, but that alone instantly puts it a rung above all "official" IM clients, as does the lack of ads).
Being nicely designed and skinnable puts it yet again a step above even most other aggregators. Trillian 3.0 is so far ahead of any other IM client in terms of clean visual presentation throughout that it's not even funny. All apps should look this good by default, and if by some remote chance you don't like it, you can just download a new skin. The entire UI is skinnable, not just the outer edges. It also supports all sorts of plugins, from RSS readers to IM forwarders to weather.
Having features like tabbed messaging and 128-bit encryption is yet another point in its favor. No other freely downloadable Windows-based IM clients have these features, that I know of.
In short, Trillian does a lot of things, does some things no other IM client does, and everything it does do, it does well. AOL is apparently copying many of the features of Trillian in Triton, which should tell you something - I don't personally know anyone who actually uses the regular AIM client anymore.