Jim Panttaja

I use Adium on my Mac - and have my Yahoo and AOL accounts on it. I also use iChat - thought not as much. Because I have an older PowerBook - I don’t have a built in camera. iChat wins when I want to use the camera - but it means unpacking it (and finding it first)… Most of the time, I use Adium.

The key features I look for are the basics. The ability to maintain multiple conversations simultaneously (and asynchronously). Also the ability - offered in Adium - to have ‘group chat’. We found these very effective at Sapias when we were doing deployments - everyone was listening in - and adding their status and questions. This is available in other tools as well.

Today I looked at Velvet Puffin. The following is from their web site:

Socially Active Instant Messenger
VelvetPuffin is a new kind of instant messenger, built on the idea that IM can be more intuitive, real-time, and socially active.

Through an Instant Messaging interface
Chat, share photos, blogs, videos & polls with friends
View your friends’ photos, blogs, videos and polls.
Receive instant alerts when friends share new content
View/share videos from YouTube, Google Video & Metacafe

Mobile Access
You can do all of the above on your mobile phone with
VelvetPuffin Mobile. (If the phone is Java based)

Velvet Puffin covered the basics (though I didn’t see the group feature). The key aspect is the ability to share pictures and videos with the people you are IMing with. There is value here from a social networking perspective - but I didn’t see any particular value added for the business setting.

Wireless matrix announced today that it is acquiring Sapias, Inc.:  Wireless Matrix Further Accelerates Expanding Mobile Resource Management Application Capabilities With Acquisition of Sapias.

I am proud of the team that we built at Sapias, and the technology and systems that Wireless Matrix is committed to utilizing as the next generation of their services.