When a new product starts making appearances all over the Web--screenshots pop up, along with bug reports and a set of forum posts from developers geared toward it--yet there's no official confirmation, it's enough to make a lot of people wonder if there's such a thing as confirmation by proxy. That seems to be just what's happening with Google Babel, the unified messenger service from Google that's showing up in quite a few places, except official ones.
The Babel service, still said to be forthcoming, is set to include Google Hangouts, Google Talk, and Messenger in its purview. However, Google Voice won't be available at launch but will be making its way into future releases. The service will boast a set of other useful features, like notification syncing across multiple devices much in the same way that iMessage would do the job, as well as over 800 emoji+ available. It's even set to work on desktops by using a Chrome app, as well as offering an iOS version, and the whole thing can even go on or off record like Google Chat can.
Sounds impressive, to be sure, but it's what's fueling these reports that's surprising. Reports have emerged about a memo from Google's own offices talking about the feature set, and there was even a note of confirmation on the name actually being "Babel" as opposed to "Babble" thanks to screenshots from an anonymous source. Meanwhile, a note of confirmation hit Techcrunch on a similar front as its own sources routed it to a set of bug reports not normally available to the public that use the name "Google Babel." Techcrunch was even routed to a post on Google+ that described Google Babel's Android app. Gmail sources have also provided a note of confirmation as well, referencing "Babel chat applications" in some notifications.
Naturally, with this all being something of an unofficial nature, there's still plenty of time for just about any part of it--even the name Google Babel itself--to be changed ahead of a full commercial release. The release date is also still somewhat up in the air, but with Google I/O a little over a month out and a host of unofficial signs cropping up, it's looking like Google I/O might be the target date when it arrives May 15.
It's somewhat strange, seeing the progression on this one. After all, there's a lot of confirmation here, but none of it is really official confirmation. Yet at the same time, it's hard to see how this couldn't be official internal workings; who would go so far as to fake all of this? It's not as though Google doesn't already get its share of buzz in the blogosphere and such, so it really doesn't need to gin up fake stories in a bid to get attention. Thus, it's fairly likely that all of these emerging but unofficial documentations are likely the real deal. And when Google I/O hits in May, the official word will likely confirm quite a bit--potentially even all--of what's already been heard.
Edited by
Jamie Epstein
