Google Talk: Down and out in Google IM, VoIP, & video-conferencing

“Hello? Can you hear me now?” The answer was “No!” this morning on the U.S. East coast and around the world if you're trying to use Google Talk.
What a revolting situation for users who depend on Google for real-time communications! At 6:40 Eastern time, reports of trouble with Google Talk  and its related Voice-over-Internet Protocol (VoIP) and video-conferencing services started coming in.

Ten minutes later, Google reported that users were having trouble with the service. “We're aware of a problem with Google Talk affecting a majority of users. The affected users are able to access Google Talk, but are seeing error messages and/or other unexpected behavior. We will provide an update by 7/26/12 7:50 AM detailing when we expect to resolve the problem. Please note that this resolution time is an estimate and may change.”
Some users had more than just “error messages.” One East-coast based media company executive said, “We're down completely. We use Google Apps here and email etc is fine. Chat is toast.”  In the UK, some users were reporting that their corporate Google Talk services were failing, but that their personal accounts were still working.
This is not just a US/UK problem. Reports on Twitter are coming from around the globe that Google Talk had failed. Officially, the only thing Google had to say was "We're aware of a problem with Google Talk, and are doing our best to resolve the issue as soon as possible.”
While users are complaining that “Google Talk is not translating into Google Action.” Google's best seems to be working. At 10:50 AM, Google stated, “Google Talk service has already been restored for some users, and we expect a resolution for all users in the near future. Please note this time frame is an estimate and may change.”
By 1 PM, Google Talk seems to be working normally. We still don't at this time what caused the service collapse. There appears to have been no connection with the Twitter crash that happened later the same day.
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