I just know that google put video voice capability to the gtalk. Please hurry to port it to the pidgin. It would be one more option (wide used) of video and voice chat for we use with our friends no linux users.
I don't know why webcam support is being such a low priority by pidgin devs. It's very embarrassing to tell my Gmail friends I can't send them files and my MSN friends my client doesn't support webcam or voice. This only contributes to the widely spread idea that Linux is feature-poor.
This is especially important as this program is the face of Ubuntu Linux - the current situation creates a word of mouth narrative of "my employee can't get files transferred to him through GChat, because he uses Ubuntu Linux" - or, even worse, "my boyfriend can't see video on MSN chats, because he uses Ubuntu Linux."
AndrewLuecke: Yes, but Google is a billion dollar corporation, they can put as much resources as they want into a project. Most Linux IM developers are working voluntarily.
Pidgin or Empathy, just get it working someone, it's obvious google is unwilling to do it and it's possible for us to do it as google has clearly stated in the release message of how open the technologies are that they used to create it (too bad it doesn't work on any open os).