Don't Shoot the Messages

By Chris Taylor

Time was when the dread moment of learning how popular you were came only with the delivery of birthday or Valentine's Day cards. Now every day is judgment day, thanks to instant messaging and the in-your-face presence of its address book (the "buddy list") on computer desktops. The software offers real-time chat with friends, family or co-workers who are online, as most now seem to be. Instant messaging, or IM, in fact, handles more missives each day than the U.S. Postal Service. Besides relying on it to evaluate their popularity levels, teenagers use IM to swap homework tips and gossip; Internet start-ups employ it in lieu of a long-distance budget; home users love it for all those times you just don't want to pick up the phone.

Which is why it's such a shame that Steve Case and Bill Gates aren't better buddies. The AOL and Microsoft bosses have spent the past week in a mini-war over this hugely popular software, which analysts consider the second most valuable piece of digital real estate in the world, after the Windows desktop. Because AOL is the undisputed king of IM, Microsoft (along with a host of other IM providers) is trying to gain access to the 40 million folks using AOL's free IM software--and is occasionally succeeding. AOL, claiming concern for users' password protection, is trying to block its rivals' advances. Net result: a cat-and-mouse game of code change and counterchange that could prevent the adoption of standards and stunt this medium for years to come.

That has users tearing out their hair. "This is one of those rare moments, like the birth of the Internet, when something can fundamentally change the way people communicate with each other," says Rob Enderle, an IM watcher at analysts Giga Information Group. "But there must be a standard for this technology to reach its potential. Otherwise, it's like you have to use two telephones."

Talk to Microsoft and AOL about the need for standards, and you get the distinct impression of being stuck in the middle of a high-minded schoolyard row. Both sides talk about the gangs they're forming to find common ground in the messaging industry, and if the other guy wants to come over and join our gang, well, that's fine with us. (For the record, AOL has hooked up with Apple, Sun, Novell and Real Networks; Microsoft's gang of strange bedfellows includes Excite, Infoseek, PeopleLink, AT&T, Yahoo and Prodigy.)

The road to this impasse is as full of mutual distrust as any of the software giants' previous disputes. Microsoft launched MSN Messenger in mid-July. Besides providing a free hotmail account, it allowed AOL buddy-list users to sign in too--if they entered their password. That set off alarm bells at AOL, which promptly blocked Microsoft's access to its server. Microsoft came up with a fix, which AOL also jammed. A terse exchange of snail mail followed. Late last week AOL customers were greeted at login by an ominous new start-up screen warning of the dangers of giving passwords to strangers.

One side looks paranoid, the other snooty. Neither is backing down. "Microsoft is using hacker tactics," says AOL vice president Barry Schuler. "This is what happens when they decide to own a market. It's shocking behavior." Microsoft's response: passwords are required only for access to AOL's IM server and aren't recorded by the software. "AOL just isn't educated on what our service does," says Microsoft Network product manager Rob Bennett.

AOL emerged looking like the greater villain last week, largely because it had earlier made public some of the source code for its IM software. Open-source proponents, who believe all code should be freely available, couldn't understand why AOL would then turn around and stomp on a rival's attempt to emulate it--even Microsoft's. "This is about money and control," says Bill Kirkner, chief technology officer at Prodigy and an open-source supporter. "AOL saw someone else was building a better mousetrap and didn't like it."

Which means neutral Netizens ought to get used to living on both sides of the Berlin Wall at once: using MSN Messenger to talk to hotmailers, and IM for their AOL comrades. Until the wall comes down, Gates and Case are unlikely to win any popularity contests. Perhaps it's time they set up their own private buddy list.