Me, which allows them to interact with one another via video and instant messaging.
The second phase, which is scheduled for the second half of 2011, will add in the remaining Skype features, including video, instant messaging and presence (an indicator of whether a person is available for a conversation).
Thanks to cheap Web cams and video-friendly instant messaging software, such as Apple 's iChat, keeping in touch via video is easier than ever.
Skype is still one of the most widely used video call, video conference and instant messaging tools on the Internet.
But while innovations like e-mail, video chatting, instant messaging, Twitter and Second Life have increased the volume of Internet chatter, they haven't necessarily made long-distance relationships any more successful, Guldner says.
Thanks to cheap Web cams and video-friendly instant messaging software, such as Apple 's (nasdaq: AAPL - news - people ) iChat, keeping in touch via video is easier than ever.
Email, instant messaging, video conferencing, and desktop sharing are common parts of the workday for many people.
What if your claims or call center agent could seamlessly use real-time communication capabilities like instant messaging and video sharing or productivity features like mail-merge right inside of CRM?
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As a result, operators can more effectively ensure a carrier-grade quality of experience for end users of High Definition voice and video, Web conferencing, instant messaging and presence, and other broadband-intensive mobile applications that go beyond the reliability of Skype, Apple FaceTime and other services suited for consumers but inadequate for the rigors of enterprise use.
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Although IBM employees have access to Sametime Unyte, a program that allows face-to-face video from practically every seat at the company, she says that IBM's remote conversations usually begin with instant messaging and only occasionally escalates into video conferencing.
The interoperability issue among video carriers is somewhat similar in proprietary Instant Messaging systems, which also await unification among their providers so that someone on, say, Yahoo IM can talk to a Google Chat consumer.
ChatON uses phone numbers instead of ID and passwords, and provides easy instant messaging and group chatting in various formats-images, video, voice, contacts-to make messaging simple and intuitive.
You can't completely pigeonhole Skype when it serves both as a partial substitute for traditional phone service and an instant messaging service with voice and video on top.
CallWave is now focused on a new service, called Fuze, which brings all forms of communication (instant messaging, alerts, voice and video) together on any portable device.
These days, tech companies are rushing to be all-in-one providers of everything from instant messaging to email to calls to video chat, reasoning that if you offer everything in one place, consumers will have little reason to go anywhere else.
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But thanks to the fast adoption of instant messaging and Internet-based telephone systems, the days of cheap and easy video calling may finally be here -- they just don't run across phone lines.
The YouTube video shows some of the various standard applications that come with the XO-1: Firefox, an unnamed instant messaging program, a variant of Abiword (word processing), and an application called eToys that looks like a combination of traditional computer games (such as Chinese Checkers) combined with something resembling the children's art program Kid Pix.
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