Apple Insider previews iChat 4.0

Why is it that all of Mac's advertisements have absolutely pefect video quality in their iChat videos? I have a brand new MBP and the quality over ichat is nowhere near perfect.

Oh dear god....Wheels - the looser version, as you call it, is taken from the French. It's the same words, the same meaning, in exactly the same way as the phrase
"déjà vu" is used in English.

The word gai / gay in the phrase *is* tbe French word, regardless of whether you say it in English, and the meaning is still the French meaning.

If you use the phrase (with any spelling) "gay paree", you are using French words, with the French meaning. Your are simply *not* using the English word "gay"

Therefore your comment was and still is factually incorrect.

Ben,

If you are using the French version, it's "'gai Paris." The looser (Americanized?) version is "gay Parie."

Gay also means happy, jovial, cheerful. I, therefore, think my last comment is still valid.

PS. I am gay and I find the "gay" meaning "stupid" usage to be slightly irritating but not terribly offensive. It seems to be used by a younger crowd than me (I'm almost 40) and not as a slur against gays. Hell, today's young people are a LOT more accepting of gays than they were when I was that age, so I don't see any reason to get upset over it. On the other hand, I don't think it's appropriate for a public forum like this.

I wasn't aware iChat already supports Google Talk, which is why I switched to Adium in the first place a year and a half ago. Sure enough it works, but I already see a couple deal breakers that will keep me on Adium unless they're given attention.

1. Is there/will there be any way to combine the buddy lists from different services in one window?
2. Is there/will there be a chat transcript history?

If either of these is "no" I am sticking with Adium.

P.S. To all those who say that we should stop discussing this issue because we disagree and will never agree I have this message. I read everything that is said on both sides of the argument, consider and make up my mind following an intelligent debate. So far my mind hasn't been changed but I am absolutely prepared to change it if someone persuades me to. I think we should encourage debate on these things, and make sure we keep an open mind.

The other thing I think we should try to do is take offence less easily. Assume that when someone says 'gay' they do not mean to insult you (unless they make it clear otherwise) and if someone calls straight people 'breeders' look at it in a good humoured way. Learning to laugh at oneself is one of the most important life skills that one will ever learn.

@19: You say "I take offense to that because that would mean I am bad or annoying because I happen to be gay."

That is absolutely not what I am saying. If you read my comment you will see I say "just because you use gay to describe bad and annoying things it does not mean you are homophobic and think homosexual people are bad or annoying". The point is that for whatever reason the word 'gay' has taken on this meaning as well as describing a homosexual person but they are separate uses of the word (just as although 'gay' can mean happy using it in this way does not imply that homosexual people are necessarily happy).

@10: I would actually take the view that the wikipedia article does support the notions I have put across. For example the final paragraph about its usage on BBC Radio specifically says that "in describing a ring tone as 'gay', the DJ was conveying that he thought it was 'rubbish', rather than 'homosexual'." Surely this usage is similar, but as I have previously stated I do see the argument for limiting its usage to avoid the risk of offence.

I only just moved to Adium 3 months ago but I think with Leopard I'll be moving back to iChat. Here's a comparison of the new iChat to Adium if anyone's interested in seeing how they stack up to each other:

http://www.nuttersmark.com/articles/31

I hope that the new version is better about NAT. I can't get the extant version to talk through the older NAT router/firewall at work, even when I open all the ports exactly as specified in the documentation.

It is peculiar, though, as I sometimes see asymmetric connectivity: A can connect to B who can connect to C who cannot connect to A.

Really frustrating...

People been asking about Jabber; I don't notice a lot of difference from iChat 3. What is nice to mention: iChat now shows the option of using your gmail address. Of course this has always been possible as gtalk uses jabber, but most people don't know.