So, what is Pownce?

Pownce is an web-based instant messaging system that can be used ex-browser if you download the Adobe Integrated Runtime.  Oh.  Its wrapped up in a pretty slick package, and you can send group messages.   That’s pretty much it.

It shouldn’t be confused with services like Twitter, which are really continuous partial attention services, or something that I’ve described as ambient broadcasting.

The reason is because unlike Twitter, or even the “status” system that’s available through Facebook, there is yet to be an easy way to update your status, or send messages (about your status) through a mobile device.  You can only message when you’re attached to the ‘net through a PC.  This difference cannot be understated because it means that when you’re at an event — literally, an event — you can broadcast information live to your friends.  You can tell them where you are, what you’re doing, what you’re thinking, and where you want to meet.  Twitter, after all, exploded after SXSW, where people were Twittering away about where they were during the festival — and in a peculiar voyeuristic way, you could almost “be” there too if you were observing the tweets.

The other, smaller, difference is that there is no character limit to the messages.  Twitter, for example, has a 140 character limit.  You might not think this is such a big thing (pun not intended), but in fact, limiting the number of characters *forces* you to create terse and important messages.  It also meshes nicely with being able to, in fact, create messages, *anywhere* you are, as mobile Twittering (or now, Twittergramming) is possible.

Both of these limitations make Pownce merely, for the most part, a fancy web based instant messaging system.  And if you think of it that way, its one that’s crippled in one vital respect, in that its not able to integrate with other instant messaging networks.

Sure, it might be so slick it might get you to change your mind about which instant messaging system you might use.  But why should you stick with *one* instant messaging system when you can plug into *all* of them at once?  That way you don’t need to port over your entire network, which is really the killer *anything* of any networked application.

Heck, that’s almost like the *other* fancy web-based instant messaging system that I *already* use.  Maybe you’ve heard of it?  Its called Meebo, and it works pretty damn well.

Now, in all fairness Pownce will probably continue to evolve beyond just being able to doing what it is just doing.  It could add a mobile component, and that would dramatically change things.  It could also add the “plug into all networks” thing, as well.

But will it?  Or will it go in another direction entirely?  Time, as they say, will tell.