JiveTalk IM for BlackBerry Video

JiveTalk IM for BlackBerry Video Transcript

JiveTalk for BlackBerry?First Look June 26, 2008 ### Hed: First Look: JiveTalk IM for BlackBerry Dek: There are a few multinetwork IM clients for BlackBerry, and JiveTalk is among the best. ### Hi, I'm JD from CNET DL.com with a FL at JiveTalk. JiveTalk is one of the better native multinetwork IM clients for any smartphone, but at the time of this taping, it happens to work on only two platforms: iPhone and BlackBerry. Right now you're going to see it in action on the BlackBerry. ### First, the essentials. JiveTalk supports AIM, Google Talk, ICQ, Jabber, Windows Live Messenger, MySpace IM, and Yahoo IM. Impressive. You can set the application to log into all accounts, or do that manually each time. The buddy list shows friends and their status clearly, and also displays an icon to delineate which network they're on. You'll be able to filter buddies by network, status, and so on from the preferences list. Open conversations show up at the top of the screen, above the buddy list. The only thing that's missing is the capability to search for friends as you begin typing their username. As it stands, you've got to scroll to send a message. ### The conversation window gives you plenty of room to run. It doesn't look like there are many options for personalization, but they're easy to get at, actually, but hitting the menu key. For example, here's that list of emoticons I can select and drop into my message. You also have choices in the way the conversation is displayed, and you'll be able to swap out any format from the preferences menu. I also like the way that JiveTalk deals with multiple open conversations by floating two talk bubbles to the top of the window. A red star pops up when you have a message waiting, and the bubble turns blue to represent which conversation you're in. ### There are a few extras as well. You can call a contact or e-mail them from JiveTalk, you can set alerts and vibrations for incoming messages, and WiFi is supported. There's also file transfer capability for a limited selection of BlackBerrys via AIM and MSN, and there's full 128-bit message encryption for everyone. ### JiveTalk costs about $20 for use on one BlackBerry device or $30 if you plan to change phone models, but, it's free for iPhone and iPod Touch users, the lucky ducks. I'm Jessica Dolcourt and this has been JiveTalk.