lonita posted a complaint from a Trillian user about AOL blocking access from Trillian users

Trillian is NOT hacking into AIM servers. Trillian does NOT damage or take control of AIM servers. Trillian merely sends communications to AIM servers; similar to a person sending an email to an AOL user.

It's nothing like sending email. Email is a cooperative, distributed system. There are millions, maybe tens of millions of email servers across the world, sharing the load. When you send email to an AOL user, it's with the understanding that your ISP also runs a mail server, and AOL can use that to get mail back to you. AIM is a centralized system. When you send an IM to an AOL user, there's no server that _you_ are paying for that is taking load off AIM.

In the face of all of this, AOL even has the audacity to file a lawsuit over Microsoft's treatment of the Netscape browser (now owned by AOL). Although IE had preferential treatment on the Windows desktop, at least Microsoft allowed Netscape to install & run on Windows. AOL is using their instant messaging monopoly position to try and COMPLETELY BLOCK Trillian from communicating with AIM users.

AOL has nothing resembling a monopoly on instant messengers. These are old statistics, but only because I couldn't find the more recent ones that show MSN Messenger getting bigger and bigger at AOL's expense.

In a survey of instant message usage in the United States released Thursday, Internet measurement company Media Metrix (a Jupiter Media Metrix company) reports that in just over a year, Yahoo and Microsoft have each amassed IM memberships totaling roughly half the population of AOL Instant Messenger (AIM). In addition, the two are increasing their audiences more rapidly than any other instant messaging companies.

As of August 2000, Yahoo Messenger had 10.6 million U.S. users, while MSN Messenger Service hit 10.3 million, the study shows. During the same period, AIM reached 21.5 million users, and AOL's ICQ subsidiary had 9.1 million, not counting international usage. ICQ numbers actually showed a decline from the previous year, when the service had more than 10 million active users.

In addition, nearly a third of AIM users also actively used a second IM client, Media Metrix found.

Yes, AOL sucks. Yes, their policy of not letting people interoperate with their Instant Messenging service is really stupid, and hurts consumers. Yes, we should all use some other service instead, which leaves us with MSN Messenger (Yay! Support an even more rapacious company instead!), Yahoo! (The poor cousin), or Jabber. (Remember, boys and girls. ICQ is owned by AOL too. So's Winamp, better stop using that as well).

Let's tell AOL how stupid they are for not interoperating. Let's remind AOL that the big problem that the Internet suffers from is people putting investors and advertisers over users, and forgetting that it's the users who are ultimately responsible for delivering money to the investors and advertisers. But let's not pretend that AOL are somehow obliged to allow people to use its service however the hell they want.

Addendum: I agree with everything Lonita said after the quoted post, I just don't agree with the polemic in the post itself. :)