I was there when it was invite only, child. They used to have an IM chat too.
Oh shit yeah! I remember begging a friend who got one to send me an invite. Didnt you only get like 3 invites to begin with or something?
I wanna say it was more than that, I don’t remember the number but I remember saying “damn that’s a lot.” I wanna say it was maybe like 10?
It was 10 yep.
Fair enough i thought they started at 3 and then bumped it up later
I can’t remember what site it was, I think it was maybe Toms Hardware for some reason. But people with extra invites would post and you could request one. That’s how I got mine, no begging necessary :)

Google still has a chat embedded in Gmail, but because Google is grotesquely incompetent they’ve never succeeded in making a good messaging service. I think they’ve had like 15, but they are too fucked up to just make one work.

arstechnica.com/…/a-decade-and-a-half-of-instabil…

One of the things I bring up if someone says “we should run the government like a business”

A decade and a half of instability: The history of Google messaging apps

Sixteen years after the launch of Google Talk, Google messaging is still a mess.

Ars Technica

The hangouts app was actually sick. You could connect to Google voice and your actual phone number allowing you to:

  • place phone calls from voice on your computer or phone
  • place phone calls from your actual number on your phone
  • send text messages from voice on your computer or phone
  • send text messages from your actual number on your phone (and possibly computer)
  • send ims from your computer or phone

It was available within gmail or on its own dedicated site, and it automatically collated conversations regardless of send medium.

It made communication free and easy regardless of what device I was using–then they rebranded it and made it IM only–then they killed it.

It’s still IM only but not dead. Hangouts became Chat and all your old Hangouts IMs should still be there. I use it all the time.
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Man I completely forgot Gmail chat existed, and I used it for a while quite regularly.