you may have noticed that...

i have a little chat widget to the right on this page. you may have also realized that it's a meebo widget. :/ i know, i know... i remember the high praises i gave for digsby and i still give that product a happy 5+ stars; however, the laptop i am on at work previously belonged to an IT nazi and now i am left without a password for something that blocks some very useful sites, downloads, and installations. ;p

to make a long story short, i'm using meebo as a workaround; for these rare situations, meebo has two thumbs up.

mobile IM apps, oh my [freeware]

yes, there is an 's' in apps.  there are serious options out there beside the basic IM client that came on your smartphone.

i used to use 'palringo' but as of today i found out that there are many similar 

[freeware] apps that cover the same stuff.  i'm hoping that they do so in a cleaner fashion that what i'm used to.  i am going to try out 'fring' next.  i had a good time with palringo but i have the feeling that there may be something better out there.

i am not advertising/backing a specific client as of yet but i am open to hearing your take on any of the below programs for your smartphone.

• palringo
• fring
• eqo
• nimbuzz
• yeigo