Ten Years Ago This Week: Google Shut Down GTalk for Windows and Moved Away From Open Messaging

To celebrate 10 years of Creator Weekly, I’m sharing tech highlights from 2015 that still resonate 10 years later. This update was for the week ending February 15, 2015.

Starting February 16, 2015 Google stopped supporting the Google Talk app for Windows, and replaced it with the Hangouts Chrome app. It was fully shut down by February 23.

Hangouts was one messaging app to rule them all (for a few years)

In early 2015 the Hangouts desktop experience included
Gmail, Google+ and a Chrome app available "across computers."

The replacement of Google Talk with Hangouts was not a big surprise. Hangouts officially launched as a messaging platform independent of Google+ in May 2013, with a big announcement at Google I/O. It had its own separate app and Gmail integration. By mid-2014 you didn't even need to have a Google+ Profile for group video calls or chatting.

The Hangouts Android app replaced the Google Talk app in 2013 as well.

Google Talk was not quite dead yet

Mayur Kamat, Product Manager for Hangouts, posted on Google+ on February 13, 2015:
"If you're not ready to make the switch to Hangouts quite yet, you can continue using Google Talk on Windows with a range of compatible third party chat apps. Please keep in mind these aren't Google products so exercise caution when signing in with your Google Account. "

The shutdown of the Windows app wasn't the complete death of Google Talk.

You could still use many third party Jabber-compatible XMPP clients, such as Pidjin, where Google Talk would federate with other domains.

But it was notable that you couldn't actually use the popular Jabber client, because Jabber started requiring server-to-server encryption in 2014, which Google Talk did not implement. You definitely were using it at your own risk.

Surprisingly, you could continue to use Google Talk in Gmail and the legacy Google Talk Android app (which had not been updated since 2013) until 2017.

Google Talk continued to work using third party clients until June 2022, just a few months before Hangouts was also shut down.

So Many Communication Apps

Google Talk fully shut down on June 16, 2022. Users were encouraged to switch to Google Chat,
because Hangouts would shut down just a few months later.

I think there are a couple of interesting big picture stories here.

First, while people love to talk about the Google Graveyard and how Google shuts things down, it actually keeps a lot of services running long after they are no longer actively developed or supported.

That does lead to a lot of confusion, because that means Google ends up with multiple competing services, and that has especially been true around messaging.

In 2018 Google maximized the communication services they offered: Hangouts, of course, plus the mobile-first Duo (video) and Allo (chat) that launched in 2016; business-focused Meet (video) and Chat (chat) that launched in 2017; Messages (SMS); and Google Talk with 3rd party clients. It was a confusing time.

Right now, with only Google Chat for text based messaging, Google Meet for video (after having merged with, then replaced Duo), and Google Messages for SMS, it's probably the least complicated Google's communication offerings have been for years.

It's not just true for communication, of course. Who among us doesn't have a favorite feature that hasn't been updated in years?

The Move Away from Open Communication Platforms

The other story is about the move away from open platforms.

XMPP is an open standard, anyone can run their own server and federate with other XMPP servers.

Federation is currently referenced a lot for social media, with Activity Pub and Mastodon and AT Protocol with Bluesky. But before all that there was messaging. That's how email or SMS works. You don't need to create an account on the same platform to message other people.

But services like chatting and video calling have mostly moved to proprietary platforms, even if they use underlying technology like XMPP. You can't use Facebook Messenger to communicate with people using Telegram or Signal or Google Chat.

What will the future bring?

With the increased interest in open decentralized social media platforms like Bluesky and Mastodon, I'm wondering if open messaging platforms are the next step.

An example of that is Matrix, which can be used for instant messaging, group chat or communities. But modern communications expect Trust & Safety efforts and new features, which are expensive (the Matrix foundation is currently asking for donations).

There are also a number of software clients for using XMPP, if you have an account on an active service.

Maybe there will be something new. Check back in 10 years.