Gmail Groups?

Gmail and Google Talk are great, but they both seem unfinished. I'm hoping this is due to the "beta" labels.

A missing feature from both are the ability to converse with multiple people simutaneously. However, recent developments lead me to think there may be a change occurring soon. The recent acquisition of Writely has been publicized as Google entering the office software market. However, Writely is also big on collaboration features. Could collaboration be the next big step Google takes? I think so.

Imagine the seamless integration of Google groups, GMail, GTalk, Google Calendar(?) and Google Local into one package. It would make online and offline collaboration much easier. Online meetings can be by any medium voice, email or IM. Offline meetings can be scheduled and planed seamlessly with Calendar and Local. This enhances the usefulness of the current Google services greatly.

The April 1st Google announcement may not be so big. But who know what may happen next year.