Google Talk chatback

Do you have a blog, online profile, or some other personal web page? Would you like to communicate more with your visitors? Today we're launching a new Google Talk feature that lets visitors to your web site chat with you. We call it "chatback" because instead of you doing all the talking on your blog, your visitors can talk back to you. Sure, they could leave comments, but those are public and hard to use for a real conversation. With chatback, it's a real instant message session.

To use chatback, you must have a Google Talk account ... but your visitors don't have to! They don't even need to have an email address, or to have ever used instant messaging.

When they visit your site, they'll see a badge like the one on the right showing your online status (available, busy, offline) and, if you're available, they can just click and start chatting. Chatback uses the web-based Google Talk Gadget so your visitors don't need to download anything. It opens in a new window so they can keep chatting with you even if they browse to other pages.

Of course, chatback isn't just for blogs. You can use it on any web page that you can add HTML content to. To get started, visit the chatback start page. (This is also linked from the Google Talk homepage.) Then just copy the provided HTML snippet to your web site. Visitors will then see a badge on your site indicating your availability, and can click to start a chat with you. If there's a time when you don't want to be distracted, just set your online status to "busy" and visitors won't be able to chat with you until you change your status back to "available."

If you're not already a Google Talk user, it's easy to become one. If you've got a Gmail account, then you already have a Google Talk account. If not, just go to www.google.com/talk or www.gmail.com to get started.

Bruce Leban
Software Engineer

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Try Google Apps Team Edition with Google Talk

It goes without saying that instant messaging has become integral to communicating in the workplace and at school. Chat helps us to share ideas instantaneously with co-workers and classmates. That's why Google Talk has always been a part of Google Apps, our package of applications built for collaborating within organizations. We're happy to announce today that we've made it even easier for you and your co-workers or classmates to start using Google Apps and Google Talk. It's called Google Apps Team Edition, and if you have an email address from your employer or school, you can sign up right now.

With Google Apps Team Edition, you and members of your organization get Google Docs, for creating and sharing documents, spreadsheets and presentations, and Google Calendar, for coordinating your schedule. When you use Google Talk with Google Apps Team Edition, your contacts list will automatically include the other people at your organization using Google Apps Team Edition. And since Team Edition recognizes your connection to co-workers or classmates, it makes sharing documents and calendars easier too. Give it a try by visiting www.google.com/apps.



Bill Kee
Associate Product Marketing Manager

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