Jeff Gamet Apple released a public beta of Messages for the Mac on Thursday that supports OS X 10.7.3, or Lion. That support, however, will end when OS X Mountain Lion ships this summer.
Messages won’t support Lion when Mountain Lion ships
Thanks to a text string Consomac found in the beta version of Messages, it looks like Lion users will get cut off from the app once Mountain Lion is released. The text string reads:
Thank you for participating in the Messages Beta program. With the inclusion of Messages in OS X Mountain Lion, the Messages Beta program has ended. To continue using Messages, please visit the Mac App Store and purchase OS X Mountain Lion.
The public beta of Messages for the Mac lets users instant message through AIM, Jabber, Yahoo! Messenger and Google Talk, but also adds SMS messaging that sidesteps cell carrier texting plans. With Messages already available as part of iOS 5, conversations are synchronized across your Mac, iPhone, iPod touch and iPad.
Apple introduced Messages for the Mac as a new feature in OS X Mountain Lion, which was also unveiled on Thursday. The new version of the Mac operating system adds more features from iOS for the iPad such as Reminders and Notification Center.
The public beta of Messages for the Mac is available as a free download at the Apple website.
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Wait a minute! What happens to my original iChat when Messages ß goes belly up? The Messages installation replaced iChat during the install, right down to it’s position in my Dock.
I’m going to be pissed about this if I have to install the first version of a new OS just to get my iChat back. I use it constantly for communicating with and maintaining the Macs of my family, which is spread out across the USA.