Windows live messenger

Having failed dismally to keep up with the ball I discovered that windows live messenger is the new name for MSN messenger 8 AND that it's on BETA AND that it's got an invite scheme (much like the rather excellent gmail).

I discovered that for the small fee of £5 i could purchase myself an invite: the rest is history.

So I didn't actually buy it, but I signed up to their registration program and 24 hours later received my free invite :D.

Subjective as you like, but I actually prefer the look and feel of it. No butterfly, orange and green. Despite this first impressions were not high.

Having found and disabled the "expand on mouse hover" option, it started to get better. Here are some of the cool features that I've found and like.

a) search for contact
b) shared folders (which are offline and can be used to distribute stuff)
c) send offline messages - now you can send messages to your contacts that are offline :D
c) send messages while appearing offline - for those interested in stealth
d) sign in with different statuses

So actually i quite like it as it goes.

And now for the downside. I have to uninstall it.... Sarah can't log into MSN with this version and you can't run both side by side :(:( Perhaps an example of a BETA trial that wasn't thought through quite as well as it might be.....