What’s Vivox? You may be using the service without knowing it. Vivox currently delivers in-game voice chat for EVE and Second Life a boasts more than 15 million users. But the service is looking to expand into a much bigger market: Facebook.
Yes, live voice chat is coming to Facebook, and I just have one thing to say: Thank god for Facebook Lite. I hate to sound curmudgeonly, and no one likes a broken record, but voice chat is the last thing I want from people on Facebook. I realize this is great news for people who use Facebook as a primary method of communication. For all of you this could be really fantastic news.
I will say, the service actually sounds really cool. It offers conference support, and users outside Facebook will be able to call in to participate in real-time chat, which could make keeping in touch a whole lot easier. One of the most interesting moves Vivox is making, though, is releasing the source code to other third-party app developers.
Vivox will run on Facebook as a plug-in, so it’s not technically part of the core set of Facebook features. By opening up the source code, Vivox is giving voice chat to anything from games to utilities. It’s pretty easy to see how Facebook is swallowing up other social services at an alarming rate. It’s nabbed chat from AIM, integrated Twitter-like features, and now looks to go after Skype. Granted, this isn’t Facbeook proper doing the last, but it’s pretty close, and this kind of integration could turn Zuckerberg’s eyes to Vivox, and potentially open his wallet.
For now Vivox is testing in closed beta, and probably won’t go public for a while. When it does, I’ll be sure to let you know, probably by mentioning once again just how much I hate Facebook.
