Google Talk now talks directly to AIM

Google has announced an upgrade to it’s Google Talk service, making it easier for users to communicate with friends on other services. Starting right now you can talk to your friends who use AIM right from Google Talk.

Your AIM friends can be added directly into Google Talk, all you have to do is add “@aol.com” at the end of their username. Then you’ll be able to talk to them anywhere you use Google Talk such as within Gmail. It means you won’t need a separate app to talk to your friends if you use an Android phone, all you need is the Google Talk app. If you have a lot of AIM buddies, and don’t want to add them one by one, don’t worry, AOL has set up a website to transfer your entire buddy list. It seems like there’s a lot of people wanting to transfer their friends, though, because the website is giving an error statin it’s over capacity as of this writing.

This is especially nice if you’re looking to consolidate all your friends into one friends list without using a third-party app like Adium or Trillian and you don’t like Facebook chat. The one use I know I’ll get out of this new ability is being able to talk to AIM friends while I’m using Chrome OS. Sure, I could open a tab of Meebo, but having a Google Talk panel just seems so much easier, and know there’s a reason to actually use it.

Read [Official Gmail Blog]