OK, this isn’t the product that we saw at the User Conference, at least as far as I can tell (I left my laptop at work so I don’t have a copy of ArcGIS to test it on). Rather than being built on MSN Messenger, GeoChat supports Jabber allowing you to use any Jabber server you wish (specifically it uses XMPP protocol which Google Talk among others uses). Since I can’t test it, I’m limited to reading the user guide but it looks very impressive and well integrated into ArcMap. My company has many offices and few people so collaboration between GIS professionals is usually done with Acrobat. GeoChat would surely simplify our workflow so I’m really wanting to try it out (I’ll have to wait until Wednesday as our office is closed on Tuesday due to it being right across the street from the Fiesta Bowl).

First Python and now Jabber. Could ArcIMS 10 be built on Mapserver? 😉