Michael Gorey

I’ve taken a look at the Meebo instant messaging web site today. This is an internet service that enables chat through a browser without having to download a program like Gaim, Trillian or Miranda.

I’m not a big IM user but I can see the potential benefits. I came to Meebo because I downloaded Portable Gaim thinking I would run it from my USB stick at work.

The company firewall had other ideas and wouldn’t let me. There are probably proxy settings I could change, but rather than go through that hassle I did a quick web search and discovered Meebo.

It works with AIM, ICQ, Jabber, GTalk, Yahoo and MSN. I have two of those, and if you register with Meebo you can access multiple services simultaneously.

There’s a widget you can install on your own web site for chat. I experimented with it, and found it works, but can’t really see the need for me personally at this stage.

There’s an article on Wikpedia which explains the history of this interesting, useful service.

These articles might be of interest:

• 10GB free webmail service
• y7mail
• Spam Gourmet eats junk