Week 2

A. Synchronous Messaging, SKYPE; MSN; TEAMSPEAK;ICQ

There is a lot of ways in which to communicate to people specially with today’s new programs, new technology, other then face to face the communication is mostly done through synchronous messaging. There are a lot of programs out there that allow us to communicate much easier through there different offerings. The communication through synchronous messaging could be used for personal things, business & students, that’s where teamwork & collaboration of teams becomes a bit easier. The programs that I will be looking at closely are ; SKYPE; MSN; TEAMSPEAK;ICQ & others like Google talk. Each one of these have different strengths & advantages when it comes to collaboration + teamwork environment.

Synchronous Messaging “Business Use/Teamwork collaboration ”

Now that there a lot of options on online meetings and internet conferences available. People need to decide on which one will give them best options as we need to decide in our mission to successfully completing this group fabrication project. There are a lot of advantages of conducting online meetings over the setting up of more traditional face to face meetings. First, the expense of face-to-face meetings can be costly, particularly when people are travelling great distances to meet together regularly. Another advantage to having online meetings as opposed to face-to-face meetings is the ability to conduct the meeting from whatever location you may be in. If you are working from home, for example, using the internet and conference software allows you to instantly connect with other members of your team, giving you more time to spend on successfully completing your task, as there is no face to face meeting needed . All this has become a bit easy through use of different programs. E.g. SKYPE; MSN; TEAMSPEAK;ICQ. (1)

· MSN

MSN is a quick way of communicating with people and it is easy to use. It is usefully in many ways like keeping in touch with you family’s, friends and also collaboration of teamwork as in this case we will use it a lot in the upcoming project.The advantages of msn is its a great tool to have when communicating about your school work, you can ask your friends if you don’t understand what needs to be done. MSN makes this easy as people don’t have to go out and meet there peers, it allows them more time to spend on completing there task. A lot of businesses use it as a easy way of communication. Meetings can be arranged easily through voice conferencing or even synchronous massaging. MSN messenger so called “Windows Live Messenger Mobile” this can be used with most mobile phones which makes it a little easy if you don’t have a computer next to you. It works same as a PC Messenger. The new MSN version have introduce the offline messaging, where you can send a message to your team members who are offline. They will receive the message once they come online. Other advantages of MSN is people can share folders, images, files. This is going to come in handy as our group will be communicating mostly over msn, the transformation of data becomes quick and easy. Looking at all the example/facts, Overall MSN plays a major role in team working environment though the above examples. (2)

· SKYPE
Skype is a popular program. It is different to msn. People mostly use Skype for phone class where they use msn for chats. A lot of businesses use Skype as it gives small businesses the market advantage against larger competitors by operating on lower costs and increasing productivity with voice calls. It has similar advantages as msn messenger like group chat, file transfer. Other options that it offers better then msn is instant conference calling, free toll-free calling. A lot of businesses use Skype as a easy way of communication with there employee in other firms where msn is mostly used for personal thing, group project within the school/uni environment.(3,4)

SKYPE or MSN “Which one do people prefer”

After talking to a few friends and peers from work. It is obvious what they use for different things. Video/Voice conversations are better to use in Skype as its more quicker. The Architectural firms that I work in uses Skype as a second way of transferring data, the first way is email. If the size is to big they use Skype. MSN is mostly used for chats where Skype is used more in the work environment. They both have there advantages, text messaging would be better with MSN where video conversation better with Skype. Most of the people that I have talked to say “MSN is good for chat”, “Skype is very good conversation”. Looking at both of these example’s in a team working environment they would both come in handy. It would save us a lot of time.

· ICQ

ICQ is another effective way of communication. It is very similar to the above example. It is used often in team working environment. ICQ has more features and allows more flexibility which are very similar to the MSN & Skype. One of the great advantages of ICQ is its chat feature that allows you to set up a invite-only chat on the internet. ICQ uses minimum amount of bandwidth and system resources. Other advantages that it has on offer are similar to the MSN. (6,7,8)

· TEAMSPEAK

Team Speak is different to the above examples of synchronous messaging, it is an application which allows its users to talk to each other over the internet. It was designed to be run in background of the online games. The voice quality is fairly good as good as normal phone calls. It is know as one of the best online gaming communications. One of the biggest advantages of TeamSpeak is that it is cross-platform voice communication tool, which means that the client and server are available for Window. It does not matter which operation system you use it is design so it works well across the board. This particular example of synchronous messaging is new to me, looking forward to knowing more about it if we come across it in our group project. (5)

· GOOGLE TALK
Google talk is another good way of communication. This is a new program which is still in the process of becoming better. It has similar advantages to Skype. Skype is actually much more versatile, especially considering that it allows users to make outbound calls to conventional telephones (for a small fee). Google Talk, on the other hand doesn’t support PC-to-Phone calls. This is just another synchronous messaging example which could be used in the team working environment. (9)

In conclusion, closely looking at all these example, they are all similar in a lot of ways. They all offer similar advantages which we can take into consideration when doing our group projects. We are very lucky to have all these on offer as it will save us a lot of running around and meeting with people. Synchronous messaging will allow us to concentrate more on the task at hand other then meeting face to face.


1. http://www.allconferenceservices.com/online-meeting.html
2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Live_Messenger
3. http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2006/01/03/skypes-advantage-cannot-be-
4. http://about.skype.com/2005/10/skype_gives_small_businesses_m.html
5. http://www.opensource-it.com/-TeamSpeak-.html
6. http://www.smashingmagazine.com/images/shortcuts/icq-logo.jpg
7. http://www.ciao.co.uk/Reviews/icq_com__75462
8. http://en.allexperts.com/q/ICQ-1433/ICQ-Pro2003b-font-color-1.htm
9. http://www.teleclick.ca/2005/08/google-talk-lacks-competitive-advantage/