instant

For Facebook Chat, a quiet and cautious Sunday debut

Facebook chose a Sunday afternoon, when much of the tech blogger corps was pleasantly enjoying real life (we can hope), to start rolling out its previously announced instant-messaging client. That's likely no coincidence: this is a major new feature for the social-networking site, and debuting it on a weekend afternoon probably ensured a smoother integration.

A Facebook employee told me in the days before the launch that it was "a big challenge" to get ready to roll out Facebook Chat to the site's 67 million members. Because of that, Facebook has opted for a gradual rollout … Read more

Facebook Chat begins a staggered rollout

After the launch of Facebook Chat was promised last week, Facebook is finally rolling out the feature. Even though the release is limited at this time, Inside Facebook was lucky enough to get a look. It appears that the rollout is on a per-network basis, with reports coming in that many of the Ivy League schools and Stanford are among the first to have access.

Facebook Chat is the third prong of communication on Facebook, adding to the already existing Wall and Message features. Unlike most IM clients, it is built directly into the web page and is not a … Read more

Reclaim your RAM

Even in these days of cheap RAM, where you can get an extra gigabyte of the stuff for around $40 or so, there's not much you can do about must-have programs that leak memory short of seeking out an alternative. That doesn't mean you're tied to incessant program restarts and operating system reboots, though: a few useful programs such as RAM Idle LE, RAMBooster, and Instant Memory Cleaner make it their business to reclaim wasted bits.

RAMBooster is well-known to longtime Daily Download readers. We've featured it in our Windows Starter Kit and in a First … Read more

Soashable clones Meebo, adds open source

They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Meebo must be awful flattered right now, because an open-source clone of what the service offered just a year or so ago has come up in the form of Soashable. Sure, it doesn't have the platform, group chat rooms, simple support for Google Talk and ICQ, or the some of the software extensions of the popular Web-based IM service, but if Pidgin is any indication of what can be done in the world of open-sourced IM, Soashable is off to a good start.

Besides the hosted Web app that supports … Read more

Facebook fires up IM, ratchets up privacy

CNET News.com's Dan Farber co-wrote this report.

Social network Facebook will roll out more extensive privacy controls Tuesday night or Wednesday morning, as well as an instant-messaging service soon after, representatives from the company announced during a press briefing at the company's headquarters in Palo Alto, Calif.

Most notable about the new privacy controls is the fact that Facebook members will now be able to choose how much of their profiles is visible to those on their friends list.

Naomi Gleit, Facebook's product manager for privacy and internationalization, previewed the updated options, which include a new &… Read more

Recession? What recession? Meebo reportedly aims to raise $25-30 million

Web-based instant messaging and chat service Meebo is planning to raise $25-30 million in venture funding, VentureBeat reported Monday.

This would likely peg Meebo's valuation at between $200 and $250 million, a whole lot more than the $60-70 million that it was reportedly worth after a funding round last year. As VentureBeat's Matt Marshall noted, investment banking flop Bear Stearns was just sold for $236 million. Never mind that reports show venture funding may be drying up and the economic forecast hasn't been getting any better recently.

Meebo, which is supported by advertising revenue, has reportedly hired … Read more

Snapshots of Polaroid

In its heyday some years back, Polaroid was one of the crown jewels of the Boston area business scene, a luminescent union of art and technology. But that was then. Today, post-bankruptcy proceedings and in the hands of new owners, it exists as little more than a brand name. Last month came the end-of-an-era announcement that it would no longer make its trademark instant film.

On Sunday, The Boston Globe ran a pair of articles in separate sections looking at the Polaroid mystique. Mark Feeney's piece, "Instant karma," pairs the Polaroid Swinger camera with the Ford Mustang … Read more

Gossip: Facebook's rumored IM service involves Social.IM acquisition

On Friday, a rumor surfaced that Facebook would be launching an internal instant-messaging service . Then, on Saturday, gossip blog Valleywag suggested that launching the IM service would involve acquiring Social.IM, a Facebook application that enables instant message chat between services like AIM, Yahoo, and Windows Live Messenger. A Social.IM exec coyly told Valleywag, "If we're being bought, I haven't gotten the call yet."

Social.IM is supported by venture backing from Valley icon Peter Thiel, who also has invested in Facebook.

One thing Valleywag didn't note is that in response to the rumor … Read more

Report: Facebook IM service will debut soon

Facebook plans to launch an instant-messaging application for members to embed on their profiles as early as next week, TechCrunch reported Friday.

Details are sketchy, but it appears that this will be a Web-based IM service that would allow Facebook users to chat with other people on their friends lists without needing to go through a third-party program. Additionally, TechCrunch's Michael Arrington detailed, the service would likely be based on the Jabber open-source platform, which would mean that third-party "universal IM" clients like Pidgin, Trillian, and Adium would be able to implement it.

Facebook representatives were not … Read more