About ICQ
Last year, the Mail.ru Group holding (not to be confused with the Mail.ru mail service) bought a number of large projects, among which was the well-known ICQ, also ICQ. The other day with a number of colleagues I managed to visit the homeland of the legendary "oh-oh" - in the very near future, wait for an overview of their Israeli office. For now - some information from the conversation with the management of the ICQ project.
Now, as you understand, the corporation has two parallel IM clients at once - this is Mail.ru Agent and, in fact, ICQ. It is not clear why, but the company does not plan to suspend any of them - both messengers will develop. Maybe there will be some kind of integration between them - only time will tell, but for now let's talk about ICQ.
')
Contrary to the popular (especially in the IT environment) opinion, the “patient” is not dead, but very much alive, which has a lot of evidence - as in former times, it is used by millions of users around the world. Jabber and Skype are not the first day trying to take the palm, but alas - so far something has happened. It was believed that Twitter would save humanity, but even for a long time it will not be able to oust or replace the good old ICQ. By the way, the traffic of IM-networks in 2011 reached 46 billion messages per day, and Twitter is already stable at 3 billion. However, these are completely different things and it is wrong to compare them.
Okay. Tell me, what is ICQ? No, well, I'm not talking about “I seek you,” of course. Protocol? Is it not OSCAR? Customer? More versions? Sorry if someone touched such an “unexpected” question, but as practice shows, the understanding of the term ICQ as such is not true for many people for a long time. Not to mention such an intimate thing as an official client :) But don’t even think that I’m going to persuade you all about something and sit back on the “flower”.
I see the reason for the “dislike of ICQ” as follows: once the official client was really creepy — it’s logical that alternative customers would scream like mushrooms after the rain. In one, the interface is beautiful, in the other is a wagon of plug-ins, in the third something else - I think everyone remembers the numerous tug-of-war ropes, they say “go to Miranda”, “go here or here, but not there” and so on. In general, the people broke into groups and each group was developed by a certain enthusiast (or a group of enthusiasts), therefore all the functionality was shifted on their shoulders.
On the one hand, ICQ is to blame for it (although alternatives always appear sooner or later, even if a very high-quality product was originally released), but who among us does not make mistakes. On the other hand, now they are doing everything possible to solve this problem - if they did not lick their native client, they obviously put them in order and continue to improve. But ... out of habit, everyone continues to turn a blind eye, because the alternative choice has already done its job, spawned a strong stereotype. Agree, now you are very reluctant to climb to watch the official client, if at all climb;)
And he, by the way, is developing very much - for example, this year a Mac version appeared, albeit not a little according to the guidelines. Multilogin and multiprotocol also already exist, in early 2012 a long-awaited synchronization of the history will appear. Simply put - the current “ICQ” is not the same ICQ, which we used the year in 2003 and by which we are still judging. Now ICQ is far from just “text scribbles with emoticons,” but also photos, videos, audio, group chats, SMS and much more. And if all this is not implemented in any RnQ, QIP, Trillian or Pidgin, this does not mean that there are no such functions. It's just that not every enthusiast developer of a third-party client will be able to support the necessary functions, and if it can, it’s not at all a fact that he wants. He is not obliged to anyone.
Now is the time to smash another stereotype to smithereens. It turns out that the company has not fought with alternative customers for several years now - the whole “struggle” lasted from July 1, 2008 to February 2009. Then there were other people behind the wheel, but from now on, no one will put a spoke in the wheels of alternative customers. Therefore, if the creators of a client write “it doesn’t work for us, it’s ICQ that’s ruined for us all my life” - don’t believe it.
And last, since I started talking. ICQ has got an updated version of the license agreement , which according to the creators, should satisfy the majority of third-party developers doing "normal" business (and not trying, for example, to criminalize the lives of their users in any way - in this case we are talking about spammers, vendors of numbers and other villains). “Having sold the soul”, the developers will be able not only to “keep their creations in tune”, but also to receive informational support from the company itself. But, unfortunately, for most third-party clients this agreement is not signed, therefore we have what we have.
At the moment, ICQ exists on almost all mobile platforms: in a glamorous iOS, in Android gaining momentum (for these two platforms, an updated version of the client came out just a few days ago), in an impressive Blackberry , in a live, but Symbian position, in a cheerful Windows Mobile . There is also a Java application, and for absolutely helpless phones (which have at least a crooked browser), a version of Web-ICQ is provided. For the completeness of the list, there is not enough of a living dead man named MeeGo , but for this platform the creation of a client is not planned yet.
Have you forgotten anyone else? No, it's just the right time for small Habrainside: by the end of the year, the company plans to release customers for two more mobile operating systems, namely Windows Phone 7 and Samsung Bada .
As you can see, if you want to get in touch, you can almost get it from the intercom phone and this, you have to admit, is a very fat plus. In general, the mobile Internet is now in priority - according to forecasts, it will catch up with PC traffic by 2014-2015. So there is nothing surprising in the fact that customers appeared under almost all platforms and “acquired autonomy.”
There is another embodiment of ICQ in our sinful world - I’m talking about a little-known thing called ICQ-on-site - as you can guess, this is ICQ, embedded directly into the site. It's one thing to just specify the ICQ number on the page, it's quite another to give the visitor the opportunity to immediately send a message without any extra gestures. A useful thing, for example, for online stores - allows you to increase the conversion of ads into real contacts. By the way, ICQ as an application already exists in some social networks.
By the way, a few years ago, ICQ mobile clients were a kind of “temporary replacement” of the stationary version - so that you can get in touch at a time when you are not at the computer. Modern mobile clients have retained this opportunity, but in general have become more independent - they no longer need a desktop, you can always register and start communicating directly from the phone. Until the heap there is integration with the address book of the phone, and the ICQ number itself can be tied to the phone number.
What, then, is this all different from whatsapp or iMessage? At least - the presence of the desktop version. Here you can communicate as you like and from anywhere. And with anyone - the audience is much wider, and the list of interlocutors is not limited only to the address book of the phone.
Although I confess honestly: WhatsApp and iMessage I like is that they do not create an internal “discomfort” - from the fact that an important program is running on the phone and it may accidentally fly out. Such a phobia is to put the phone in your pocket and, in an hour, find the lack of connection with the server and several messages from people already offline. Now it’s not even lazy to flip through the list of online contacts - just write a message to the right person and it will come. However, as practice has shown, the new “mobile ICQ” is also doing quite well with this.
At the end of the meeting, I asked to tell about some unusual fakap or about something funny from the life of ICQ. It turned out that relatively recently there was a case in Hong Kong when a popular blogger created a publication, saying, “let's put ICQ on, like in the old days, let's pause and pause for a moment” - this call was not just supported “with a bang”, but literally scattered like a virus. The result was hundreds of thousands of downloads of the official client and registrations, which resulted in a solid load and attracted the attention of the company.
So, maybe this ... too, we will ponobalize, we will show, so to speak, Habraeffekt? Well, or am I no longer a popular blogger? ;)
Have a nice day!
Now, as you understand, the corporation has two parallel IM clients at once - this is Mail.ru Agent and, in fact, ICQ. It is not clear why, but the company does not plan to suspend any of them - both messengers will develop. Maybe there will be some kind of integration between them - only time will tell, but for now let's talk about ICQ.
')
Contrary to the popular (especially in the IT environment) opinion, the “patient” is not dead, but very much alive, which has a lot of evidence - as in former times, it is used by millions of users around the world. Jabber and Skype are not the first day trying to take the palm, but alas - so far something has happened. It was believed that Twitter would save humanity, but even for a long time it will not be able to oust or replace the good old ICQ. By the way, the traffic of IM-networks in 2011 reached 46 billion messages per day, and Twitter is already stable at 3 billion. However, these are completely different things and it is wrong to compare them.
Okay. Tell me, what is ICQ? No, well, I'm not talking about “I seek you,” of course. Protocol? Is it not OSCAR? Customer? More versions? Sorry if someone touched such an “unexpected” question, but as practice shows, the understanding of the term ICQ as such is not true for many people for a long time. Not to mention such an intimate thing as an official client :) But don’t even think that I’m going to persuade you all about something and sit back on the “flower”.
I see the reason for the “dislike of ICQ” as follows: once the official client was really creepy — it’s logical that alternative customers would scream like mushrooms after the rain. In one, the interface is beautiful, in the other is a wagon of plug-ins, in the third something else - I think everyone remembers the numerous tug-of-war ropes, they say “go to Miranda”, “go here or here, but not there” and so on. In general, the people broke into groups and each group was developed by a certain enthusiast (or a group of enthusiasts), therefore all the functionality was shifted on their shoulders.
On the one hand, ICQ is to blame for it (although alternatives always appear sooner or later, even if a very high-quality product was originally released), but who among us does not make mistakes. On the other hand, now they are doing everything possible to solve this problem - if they did not lick their native client, they obviously put them in order and continue to improve. But ... out of habit, everyone continues to turn a blind eye, because the alternative choice has already done its job, spawned a strong stereotype. Agree, now you are very reluctant to climb to watch the official client, if at all climb;)
And he, by the way, is developing very much - for example, this year a Mac version appeared, albeit not a little according to the guidelines. Multilogin and multiprotocol also already exist, in early 2012 a long-awaited synchronization of the history will appear. Simply put - the current “ICQ” is not the same ICQ, which we used the year in 2003 and by which we are still judging. Now ICQ is far from just “text scribbles with emoticons,” but also photos, videos, audio, group chats, SMS and much more. And if all this is not implemented in any RnQ, QIP, Trillian or Pidgin, this does not mean that there are no such functions. It's just that not every enthusiast developer of a third-party client will be able to support the necessary functions, and if it can, it’s not at all a fact that he wants. He is not obliged to anyone.
Now is the time to smash another stereotype to smithereens. It turns out that the company has not fought with alternative customers for several years now - the whole “struggle” lasted from July 1, 2008 to February 2009. Then there were other people behind the wheel, but from now on, no one will put a spoke in the wheels of alternative customers. Therefore, if the creators of a client write “it doesn’t work for us, it’s ICQ that’s ruined for us all my life” - don’t believe it.
And last, since I started talking. ICQ has got an updated version of the license agreement , which according to the creators, should satisfy the majority of third-party developers doing "normal" business (and not trying, for example, to criminalize the lives of their users in any way - in this case we are talking about spammers, vendors of numbers and other villains). “Having sold the soul”, the developers will be able not only to “keep their creations in tune”, but also to receive informational support from the company itself. But, unfortunately, for most third-party clients this agreement is not signed, therefore we have what we have.
At the moment, ICQ exists on almost all mobile platforms: in a glamorous iOS, in Android gaining momentum (for these two platforms, an updated version of the client came out just a few days ago), in an impressive Blackberry , in a live, but Symbian position, in a cheerful Windows Mobile . There is also a Java application, and for absolutely helpless phones (which have at least a crooked browser), a version of Web-ICQ is provided. For the completeness of the list, there is not enough of a living dead man named MeeGo , but for this platform the creation of a client is not planned yet.
Have you forgotten anyone else? No, it's just the right time for small Habrainside: by the end of the year, the company plans to release customers for two more mobile operating systems, namely Windows Phone 7 and Samsung Bada .
As you can see, if you want to get in touch, you can almost get it from the intercom phone and this, you have to admit, is a very fat plus. In general, the mobile Internet is now in priority - according to forecasts, it will catch up with PC traffic by 2014-2015. So there is nothing surprising in the fact that customers appeared under almost all platforms and “acquired autonomy.”
There is another embodiment of ICQ in our sinful world - I’m talking about a little-known thing called ICQ-on-site - as you can guess, this is ICQ, embedded directly into the site. It's one thing to just specify the ICQ number on the page, it's quite another to give the visitor the opportunity to immediately send a message without any extra gestures. A useful thing, for example, for online stores - allows you to increase the conversion of ads into real contacts. By the way, ICQ as an application already exists in some social networks.
By the way, a few years ago, ICQ mobile clients were a kind of “temporary replacement” of the stationary version - so that you can get in touch at a time when you are not at the computer. Modern mobile clients have retained this opportunity, but in general have become more independent - they no longer need a desktop, you can always register and start communicating directly from the phone. Until the heap there is integration with the address book of the phone, and the ICQ number itself can be tied to the phone number.
What, then, is this all different from whatsapp or iMessage? At least - the presence of the desktop version. Here you can communicate as you like and from anywhere. And with anyone - the audience is much wider, and the list of interlocutors is not limited only to the address book of the phone.
Although I confess honestly: WhatsApp and iMessage I like is that they do not create an internal “discomfort” - from the fact that an important program is running on the phone and it may accidentally fly out. Such a phobia is to put the phone in your pocket and, in an hour, find the lack of connection with the server and several messages from people already offline. Now it’s not even lazy to flip through the list of online contacts - just write a message to the right person and it will come. However, as practice has shown, the new “mobile ICQ” is also doing quite well with this.
At the end of the meeting, I asked to tell about some unusual fakap or about something funny from the life of ICQ. It turned out that relatively recently there was a case in Hong Kong when a popular blogger created a publication, saying, “let's put ICQ on, like in the old days, let's pause and pause for a moment” - this call was not just supported “with a bang”, but literally scattered like a virus. The result was hundreds of thousands of downloads of the official client and registrations, which resulted in a solid load and attracted the attention of the company.
So, maybe this ... too, we will ponobalize, we will show, so to speak, Habraeffekt? Well, or am I no longer a popular blogger? ;)
Have a nice day!
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/135054/
All Articles