TM is going to release something new, something that makes every Malaysia Internet users having more convenient moment while using the Internet. TM named this service as iTalk Whoa! I am lucky to be able to get some information about this service and share with you all.
From the details I have, it is basically a web portal service at http://www.italkwhoa.com which consist of several important components.
They are:
1. Instant Messaging
2. Email
3. Calendar/Organizer
4. Contact Address Book
5. Microblogging (Twitter)
6. VOIP
7. SMS
This article will be just a brief introduction only, I am going to write more details for each components of the iTalk Whoa! after I had totally tested all the components of it.
It is running as a web portal, so you do not need to download anything to install it before using it. All you need is just your web browser and a Internet connection. Of course, some of the components in the iTalk Whoa! such as the VOIP function do need you to have the Flash plugin installed for your web browser. I think it is not a problem installing Flash since everyone also have Flash installed for their web browser to watch Youtube.
Here is the components information I am able to share with you all according to the information I obtained.
Instant Messaging:
I am sure that some of you do heard before TM’s instant messaging service which is called Mojikan a.k.a iTalk Buddy, which it is still under beta. But I do not see anything about Mojikan in the iTalk Whoa! service. Instead, it is a very cool feature where you can link most of your instant messaging service such as Yahoo Messenger, MSM Live Messenger, Google Talk, AIM, Facebook Chat, Myspace Chat and possibly some others instant messaging networks.
It is something similar like eBuddy. But eBuddy is limited to instant messaging only, while iTalk Whoa! got more other features.
I suspect that iTalk Whoa! is running on similar type of framework like what eBuddy or Pigin IM is running, which it is capable to connect to multiple IM networks. Although it is not something new, but hey, so far I see only a few web portal is offering service like this, and the best thing is, it is “Buatan Malaysia!” Our own country product! So be proud of it!
Email:
iTalk Whoa! is also offering email service. You might think that why use iTalk Whoa! while you already have Gmail or Yahoo Mail? At first I am thinking the same thing like you. But after I read through the details, I found that it is not only a normal email service. iTalk Whoa! email service is something like an email client software, just the same like Microsoft Outlook, Evolution, Mozilla Thunderbird etc which it is capable of fetching your emails in your Gmail, Yahoo Mail, Live/Hotmail and other email services.
Besides receiving emails, you can also send emails using it and still using your existing email address such as your gmail.com or yahoo.com emails.
From what I see, it looks like it is fetching the emails from your other email accounts via POP3 protocol and sending the emails via SMTP protocol to communicate between your iTalk Whoa! account to your other emails providers.
Calendar/Organizer & Contact Address Book:
These 2 functions is also available like what you have in Microsoft Outlook and Evolution. They do the same thing like Microsoft Outlook and Evolution. So it means you can use it as organizer to do your schedule, mark your appointments etc. Just the same like what you can do with Google Calendar.
And for the contact address book, it is for you to manage your email contacts where it will also be useful when you are sending email via the iTalk Whoa! portal. Not only that, you can also use it to store phone numbers for use with the iTalk Whoa! Voice(VOIP). Just click the contact name, and you can either send email to your friend or call them via the Internet.
On top of that, you can even synchronize you mobile phone’s contacts, phone numbers, email address(if you using a 3G phone), as well as your mobile phone’s calendar/organizer information.
Of course, if you are using old phone like Nokia 3310, you can’t sync the data. But for the new phones, are can sync your data easily to your iTalk Whoa! account.
Blackberry and iPhone users will definitely enjoy this a lot.
Hey wait! Even my Nokia 7373 Armour Limited Edition and my Motorola C380 dinosaur colour screen phone is also capable of doing the sync.
Lol
VOIP/SMS:
Yes, something similar to Skype. I’m sure a lot of you been used Skype before and don’t need me to explain what it is. As you all know, when you make phone call to mobile phones and land line, you will need to pay for it with the credit that you have paid as prepaid credits. Same goes to iTalk Whoa!
And same as Skype, you can also SMS to mobile phones via iTalk Whoa!
Microblogging (Twitter):
A lot people nowadays is twittering via 3rd party softwares like Gwibber, TweetDeck etc.
Therefore, Twitter is an important things to be integrated into this iTalk Whoa! as well, since it is a Twitter world now.
Same as other 3rd party Twitter softwares and web application, iTalk Whoa! should be using API call to link between your iTalk Whoa! account and your Twitter account.
So, you can also read any tweets updates as well as post your tweets to Twitter inside iTalk Whoa! as well.
Conclusion:
A lot of these other applications like Outlook, Gwibber, Skype, TweetDeck, Thunderbird etc need you to download and install their software before you can use them. And each of these software installation only give you 1 feature only, such as Gwibber, TweetDeck is only capable for Twitering. Skype is only capable of VOIP, SMS and instant messaging within its own network only. Outlook, Evolution is only for email, calendar/organizer only.
While for iTalk Whoa!, it is a group of web applications under a web portal.
All above services is unified at the same place.
And nothing needs to be installed for using it. Of course, a web browser and Flash plugin is a must.
But hey, no need to install a lot things to use several services. This is something good.
Anyway, this service is meant to be target to Windows users only as it only able to run properly on Internet Explorer 6 or above only. So it means Linux/BSD/Unix or MacOS users will not be able to enjoy this service.
I’ve tried to load the site via Firefox with useragent switcher and masking as Internet Explorer, but it is not able to load. It seems like it is dependent on certain components of Internet Explorer.
Anyway, I will try to get more information about this iTalk Whoa! and share with everyone.
Once I get it, I will post it here!