Mac users have generally gotten the short end of the stick when it came to IM clients. While they gained features like voice calling and video conferencing on Windows, Mac versions have mostly gotten little more than text support. The last time AOL itself actually included voice chat on the Mac version of AIM was OS 9. Yahoo has had a renewed interest in the Mac version of their IM client, first rewriting in Cocoa recently.
It’s now gained voice support (in a new beta version). Not only can you call other Yahoo Messenger users, but also call regular phone numbers and receive phone calls (assuming you purchase “out” time and an “in” number). US number calling is a cent per minute and an incoming phone number is $2.95.
Not bad at all. Unfortunately, no one I really know uses Yahoo and I already purchased phone services from Skype. Still, I applaud Yahoo for supporting us.
That title could so easily had been a Dune joke. Missed opportunities.
Yahoo? Too little too late. Make mine Skype. Now that they 've got a beta I expect it will be another 10 to 15 years before they get around to giving us a finished product. I'd like to applaud them finally pulling their head out, but I'm tired of rewarding the laggards.
Could it be that Yahoo is finally listening? After I posted on Versiontracker exactly how they deal with feature parity requests?
While I'm not saying I'm the smoking gun in the quest for feature parity, I will say it's about friggin' time Yahoo gives us feature parity.