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Gtalkr, a flash-based website to access Google’s Gtalk, launched yesterday. It allows you to access your Gtalk instant messaging account without a client, from any computer.
Comparisons will inevitably be drawn to Meebo, a similar service, although built on Ajax, that allows users to access a variety of instant messaging services (including gtalk). I wrote about Meebo back in September, and the passionate user comments to that post illustrate the popularity of these services.
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Gtalkr is taking a different approach by focusing just on Gtalk, and adding in additional features to, I assume, get users to use it more as a home page or dashboard. Gmail emails are pulled in as well as Yahoo maps (Google maps doesn’t have a flash API, Yahoo does). Gtalkr also plans on pulling in addtiional services, such as del.icio.us and flickr. Independent Flash developers can create these extensions as well.
It’s a useful tool, and like most flash applications I see, very well designed. It does not support gtalk voice (just text IM), and a few bugs are being worked out. See Brian Benzinger and Om Malik for more.