I used to use MSN exclusively in the good old days, but now I mainly use a combination of Skype and Meebo and in some cases,  Digsby. I am not permanently signed on to any network, I do not like distractions, and I either see most of my friends every week, or email them or call them. For clients and firends abroad we also usually use email, or Skype, if any other networks come up, I use Meebo.

However, I like Digsby a lot, since it supports a lot of networks, has email and twitter built in and some nifty added extras which make it the best all round IM client out there in my opinion. Overall though I am a solitary kind of guy, especially when I’m working, so I don’t really need it a lot. Which is your favorite client, how do you use IM networks? Let us know in the comments!

The Imo.im team was rather busy since my last review of the service and has added two additional services. The first is the addition of Skype. The user can login using his Skype user data and will see a tab with his buddies and their status. He can chat with his buddies and even call them without difficulties. That feature is both available in the web client and the local software program that is downloaded to the computer.

The only restriction is currently that outbound calls are not supported. The second addition is that of MySypace IM. If I’m honest I did not even know that something like MySpace IM existed until I found the reference at the Imo.im website.

It looks like Skype with a MySpace plugin. Still, if anyone uses that he can also use that at Imo.im. I really like the Skype addition, mainly because Skype is the only service that I use regularly from the ones that are supported. Could be handy to use it to make a quick call or write a message to a friend.

Luckily Adobe Air was built exactly for these needs and a nice person has made us a desktop version of Meebo, called Meebone, which acts exactly the same way, but doesn’t have the rooms, banners, and stuff that have made Meebo a bit less appealing to me nowadays. There’s really not much more to say about this application, log on and use Meebo as you would normally.

To me this is probably the first application which shows the power of Adobe Air. Meebo is a fully browser based application and is taken off your browser seamlessly with it. This means that now people like me who love a browser based apps, but sometimes need desktop power can enjoy the apps they love.

Gabtastik is a WebKit based Site Specific Browser (SSB) for web chat services currently in Beta that runs on Windows XP, Windows Vista and Mac OS X 10.4 or later computers. The Adobe Flash Player is the only other requirement besides an account at Facebook and / or Google Mail.

The beta version does not offered a lot of add-ons over the original chat applications on the websites. We already covered performance and the only two additional features are transparency which can be set in the desktop client and the ability to quickly switch between both chats. But that is more or less also provided in modern browsers where users can simply switch between tabs to do the same.

Interestingly enough the Mac client of Gabtastic in version 0.20 is supporting meebo as well providing access to several Instant Messengers like AIM, MSN and Yahoo while the Windows 0.21 version does not support these yet. The creators definitely have to add more value to the application to make it a must have alternative.

Popular web services like Meebo get blocked from school, university and work networks quite frequently and it is always nice to have an ace – Koolim – in your sleeve. Koolim should work even if the computer you are working with is protected by a firewall.

Koolim supports the major Instant Messenger networks: AIM, MSN, Yahoo, Google Talk and ICQ plus several lesser known networks such as Jabber, X-Fire and Gadu-Gadu.

Every user has the option to either log into any of the IM networks by entering his username and password or by signing up to Koolim and handling matters from the inside.

Read More:

Koolim Homepage
via: Genbeta

Many schools and universities already banned the Meebo website from their networks and it was almost impossible to access Meebo from within the network. The Meebo team created a application called Meebo repeater which acts as a proxy and makes it possible again to use Meebo from within the network. The only catch is that it has to be running on a computer all the time, they suggest you run it from your computer at home which would mean you should pay a flat fee for the internet, otherwise this would not be practical.

All you have to do is download the Meebo repeater from the Meebo website, unpack it and run it. The Meebo repeater will automatically configure the service and tell you the internet address that you will have to use to connect to Meebo. You might have to configure your firewall to allow Meebo repeater access to the net.

Meebo repeater is open source and able to use SSL and standard connections to the Meebo network. If you can’t live without Meebo use th Meebo repeater, works great.