Facebook Chat has officially been launched on a few networks and will be integrated into other networks in the coming weeks. This is huge, people. I think that this feature is just as important as when they started allowing unlimited photo upload. Recently I read somewhere that social networking isn’t very social. Writing a testimonial or on someone’s wall is as significant as leaving a stick note on someone’s fridge when they’re not there.

Seeing your friends online and talking to them is an easy way to catch up with someone in real time. I haven’t said it much since Facebook spammed me with 3rd party Applications, but well done. Maybe Digg should consider this feature for their member-base too. I’d rather have it built into the site than having to donwload additional chat software (Pownce).

Here are some screenshots I got from Inside Facebook:

1.)
Facebook Chat shows he number of all your friends that are online and has the option to embed the mini-feed.

2.)
The notifications menu has moved down to the Chat status bar.

3.)
Small screen shot of the buddy list.

4.)
Sample chat conversation

5.)
Another chat conversation screen shot

6.)

The red bubble indicates a new message.

The announcement was also made official on The Facebook Blog by Josh Wiseman.