While there may still be a lot of confusion surrounding the future of AOL, that didn’t stop the folks in Northern Virginia from recently overhauling their popular AIM instant messaging app for iPhone (and iPod touch).
Available in two tasty flavors, free (”AIM Free”) and paid (”AIM Paid”), AIM 2.0 for iPhone now provides SMS notifications, has location-aware services, and supports multiple accounts (among other updates). It appears as though all of the application updates have been included in both the free and paid versions, with the major (and obvious) difference being the inclusion of ads in the buddy list of the AIM Free app.
So, what’s the big deal here? What do all the changes mean? Well, for one thing, now when you first sign in, the app will ask you if you want to share your current location:
Want to see where your friends are hanging out? You can share your location with your Buddies (or everyone) and see Buddies who are sharing their location.
Users are given three options: 1. No, don’t share location (default); 2. Share only with people on my Buddy list; or 3. Share with everyone. Once you’ve made your selection (let’s say we pick option 2 or 3), a new Group will be added – “Near Me” – showing other contacts within your vicinity. As Ars Technica points out, “there is no control over how large one’s nearby radius is” and thus, it is not exactly clear how near or far any of your contacts may be from your current location. What you can control, is the frequency of your location updates by navigating to: My Info > Preferences > (scroll down) Frequency. Here, you can select between 3 options: 1. On Startup; 2. Every 5 min. (default); or 3. Every 2000 feet.
Beyond location-awareness, AIM 2.0 also features SMS capabilities. Users now have the option to send an IM to a screen name, or alternatively, can send an SMS to a contact’s phone number (works on both iPhone and iPod touch). The app now includes both a buddy list and a contact list, to take advantage of these new features. Also, you can now stay logged-in for up to 24 hours, even if the AIM app has been closed. This allows you (iPhone users only) to get notifications via SMS when you receive a new IM and offers a work-around until Apple enables real Push notifications.
Other notable new features include the ability to use photos (taken with an iPhone) as buddy icons and the option to configure/switch between multiple screen names at any time. Are these new features enough to take down competing IM apps such as IM+, Fring, Truphone, and others? Only time will tell.
AIM Free (2.0.1) is currently available for download (via iTunes), while the cleverly named (but as yet unpriced) AIM Paid is still pending approval (at the time of this writing).
When are we going to see Apple start using that ’special sauce’ we have all been waiting for. You know, the background push that has been promised for what feels like over a year? Oh wait, it HAS been over a year.
Never. Seriously.
I don’t know if they were lying when they announced it, or just aren’t smart enough to come up with a good system, but the whole idea was silly to begin with.
The push system was intended as a work-around for the limited memory in the iPhone (which also causes Safari to crash all the time).
It’s far more likely that the next gen iPhone will have enough main memory, and introduce real multitasking. That will eliminate the need for a vaporware notification system.
I disagree – It was a good design but the is politics. Just think of the revenue lost by carriers over push technologies. SMS? Why bother – use IM. Its the same reason I’m certain that major VoIP apps are still missing – the carriers are scared sh!tless on those items.
A good design? They didn’t design anything! They announced a feature that they were incapable of delivering. Such a system would have been needlessly complicated, and would have been obsoleted by a device that could multitask anyway.
That’s why Apple gave up. Apple is a software/hardware company, not a web-services company. They couldn’t even get MobileMe to work! They would have needed a persistent connection to every iPhone, and it would have been hell to manage and route it all.
Don’t blame the carrier, either. If Apple were letting AT&T call the shots, wouldn’t they have cleared the push system with them before announcing it? AT&T doesn’t restrict was users can do on Windows Mobile phones. Do you think that Apple is a lesser partner with AT&T?
Mike, it’s this fact and other stubborn, almost arbitrary, holdout features such as system-wide copy/paste, that is forcing me to root for entrants such as the Palm Pre (WebOS) to energize the market.
I used the upgraded app last night and because of the position of the ads I kept hitting them. I wouldn’t be happy if I was the advertiser because all those clicks were without return. AOL needs to move those ads.
AIM iPhone app Nooo… {seesmic_video:{”url_thumbnail”:{”value”:”http://t.seesmic.com/thumbnail/kGR8iNXbGP_th1.jpg”}”title”:{”value”:”AIM iPhone app Nooo… ”}”videoUri”:{”value”:”http://www.seesmic.com/video/dK9g1lgmbm”}}}
You are not in touch with reality if you think no one uses AIM anymore. ENOUGH with the video comments.
The iPhone is a completely different platform. Apple doesn’t allow you to ‘bloat it up’
In regards to the article, how much does AOL hope to make off the paid version? Shouldn’t they be focusing on preventing AIM from dying by perhaps adding value to the service?
Seesmic is the worst addition to this site…
uh…videos aren’t a good idea to put on the site. haha AIM is nothing without push. nuff said
Please AOL, you guys are an ad-centric juggernaut wanna be. Fring ftw
http://tr.im/gOUl
What a completely useless app.
We’re basically paying to find out which AIM buddy is near me? Or actually out and about? Who cares! SMS notifications? What is this? 2004? Seriously, these people need to get a grip. AIM — or any chat client for that matter, w/out push is not worth the $$. What an absolutely hilarious notion to think this will actually… well.. sell LOL
good post
good post
Great post
My ancient Blackberry can do all this in the background at the same time and still have cycles left for everything I need to do with it. Why can’t my iPhone do it? What’s wrong with Apple’s iPhone architecture?