The difference is that this exists within Facebook, not a "Google lab." People don't spend all day logged into Google Labs.

smells that way. the difference is that facebook understands why Wave failed.

Wave failed because it had no interface to existing services. From that facebook blog post, it looks to me like facebook messages will have "transports" to email, IM (icq, aim, jabber, ...?), phone/SMS.

That's important. Really important. That way, there's no way you "lose" your friends by adapting the new system. You can still reach them!

I'd love to have a seamless experience between ...

* short urgent messages (SMS) * short low-priority messages (IM) * long messages (email)

facebook messages promises that. i'm tempted to see for myself.

Yeah, but they had also hired the guy who created gmail ;)

Yeah, but Paul Buchheit did not work on this. He confirmed it somewhere on HN IIRC.

I can see this coming : in the news, facebook recycles google's open source wave protocol. In reply, Google closes wave protocol.

Google wave idea is good, but nobody really know what it is best for. For everything it does, there is something else that does it better and more focus. And I think part of the failure is mass adoption. They do not know what it is good for, but the launch only limits to a small amount of people. If they started day one for everyone to use it, someone some how might figure out what it is and how people should use it. By the time, I finally got an invite, after begging and begging, most people already moved on to something else.

Comparisons with Wave seem lazy.

Wave took something that worked and made it worse -- fewer contacts, bloated app, confusing purpose.

FB is taking something that works and making it better (for its users) -- more streamlined (like chat), less hassle (existing friends list), less noise ('Other' bin).

Certainly they took some lessons from Wave, and that's good, for all the flop it was it had quite a lot of good ideas, and the main goal, of making "a better e-mail" was also something I was supporting. Let's see, maybe this will mobilize others (Google) to try again.