Meebo...
It's been a while since we first covered Meebo and while it's not in my top 5 list of all things IM, it's without doubt on the "must have list". The great thing about Meebo is that no download is required.. all you need to do is spring open your browser, head along to http://www.meebo.com, login with your Meebo account (or directly via your pre-existing IM accounts ) and you suddenly have access to all your Yahoo!, AIM, ICQ, GoogleTalk and Jabber buddies. Meebo is simplicity in its finest form, it's elegant, beautifully functional and very intuitive so anyone can use it... a newbie or an experienced IM'r... and its because of this that Meebo gained a huge following and is one of the most popular browser based IMs around today...

In the early days one of the big drawcards, but certainly not the only reason, for ppl to use Meebo was that it was relatively unheard of, as such, a lot of system admins who block all Instant Messenger activity (via download, installation or browser) were not aware that Meebo even existed so they never blocked access to it... this caused Meebo to get a strong foothold as ppl became aware that they could now turn up and work / school and once again have full unrestricted IM contact with all their Yahoo!, AIM, ICQ, GoogleTalk and Jabber buddies all via a browser.. but then system admins started to twig to what was going on.. they aren't daft you know ;) ... so suddenly more and more ppl found that they were once again IM-less and Meebo access was all stitched up... or was it?

On 19 May 2006 (mentioned in their blog posting practice safe meebo) Meebo released the Meebo Repeater which (instantly) thrilled an awful lot of ppl, simply because once the repeater was installed on an unrestricted PC (like their home computer), they could once again access Meebo from some (now) restricted areas like work, school, etc. What the repeater does is turn your home PC into a middle man of sorts.. you turn up at work, want to connect to Meebo but your server admin has blocked all outgoing access to it, so you connect to your home PC via your browser (using the URL the repeater provides), this in turns re-routes you to the Meebo website where you once again have full unrestricted access to all your Yahoo!, AIM, ICQ, GoogleTalk and Jabber buddies friends.... but does it?

When the Meebo Repeater first came out we heard a lot of great things about it.. mostly from ppl who were thrilled they suddenly had full IM contact at school /work again ;) now we are hearing that the repeater isn't redirecting correctly, the most recent thread in their forum (Meebo Repeater No Longer Working) also seems to indicate this... in all fairness to Meebo though, their blog entry does state "It was fun to build and it’s an experimental project (so no guarantees)" ... but it would still be nice to know if it's on the cards to be addressed or if it's still going to be an ongoing project... if you have had a response from Meebo Support or still have a full functioning Meebo Repeater in place it would be great if you could let us know... if only because we are just plain nosey :D

Looking for a(nother) MSN® browser based alternative?

bored of Microsoft's official webmessenger.msn.com? then check out messengerFX
which gives you access to not only your MSN friends via your browser (no download requred) but also:
Status selection
Change your display picture and display name
Block / unBlock, Add, Remove friends
uses the Microsoft default emoticons
see WackyB.co.nz ~ messengerFX for more information :)

Very cool if you're Meebo.com!

Web Based Instant Messaging can be pretty ho hum especially if you stick to the traditional ones offered by Yahoo!, MSN, AIM etc which are all rather dated, in fact they kinda remind me of my grandmothers underwear... functional, not overly attractive and to be honest they are a bit of a hazard on a brisk windy day when it comes to staying power... but thankfully times have changed and so have some browser based Instant Messengers. When it comes to springing open an IM conversation in your browser window... the answer these days is really quite simple... Meebo and you can read more about it in our Meebo article.

Have you noticed our meebo bee chat window in the left hand navigation menu on every page? Isn't it just the coolest little way to stay in touch with each other :) If you want to take it for a test drive then feel free, it also lets you leave offline messages so don't worry if I'm not around, just fire away and I'll get it the next time I login to Meebo and if you want to know more about it and how to get one for your own website or blog then check out our article Meebo Me