configgum

Oh, Meebo. I really thought you might be the one.

I was excited about Meebo at first because it’s all in the browser, there’s no software to download and install, and I have my browser open all the time anyway, so it seemed like a win-win, one less window to keep open all the time for im. Having said that…I actually don’t like the interface very much. It just felt kind of claustrophobic being stuck in the browser tab. Having to switch from the tab I was reading to mess with the Meebo stuff was irritating. You can pop the ims and buddylist out. but I still ended up having to be in the Meebo tab all the time, and then you’ve got the extra windows open anyway.

I’m probably just a little cranky about it all because it was a bit of a hassle to get stuff going, but that’s only because I have No Script installed and nothing was loading. The blocked scripts weren’t showing up in the windows so I didn’t realize that was the problem right away…you also have to allow the TokBox script for the calls to work. Found it in the right-click menu eventually. Duh, honestly. My bad.

I also installed the Firefox extension for the sidebar. I thought would be great for me because I already have the sidebar open most of the time when I’m browsing (fantastic with the del.ici.ous bookmarks extension). It’s really a shame you have to keep that Meebo tab open, it would be much better to have it all in the sidebar and just pop out the ims when you need to. I wouldn’t mind too much if the tab was just in the background, but you can’t pop out the ims straight from the sidebar. Same with the drag and drop to the sidebar - it would be great and really useful IF it didn’t bring you back to the Meebo tab every single time…grrr.

What else? Welllll, the video calling wasn’t great. The windows are small and they don’t give you a lot of options…none as far as I can tell. Some of the other features were appealing, like being able to share videos and watch in the rooms, but not a significant benefit for me. The voice and video calling being integrated bothers me. A lot. And you can’t be on a voice or video call at the same time as using the other applications like playing games…but the games seemed kinda meh anyway (well the sheep one sucked lol). The pacman and ghosty emoticons, however, were seriously awesome. I wish I could take them with me everywhere I go.

Conclusion: I want a lot more control over my voice and video calling than Meebo offers, but that’s not their thing and that’s cool. I think they have some good features that can only get better, but there’s still plenty of room to improve. Being able to access all your im accounts and use them from any browser could be extremely useful, and it’s reassuring to know that Meebo’s there if I need it. All the same, I don’t really think I’ll get much use out of it.

So there you have it. Sorry Meebo. It’s cool, we can still be friends. :p

Ok, I’m just gonna post this here because I don’t want to start a whole new blog for this right now.

Just a few days ago I was trying to explain to a friend of mine this pet peeve I have about people misusing apostrophes, specifically unnecessarily adding apostrophes to plural words or words that end in s. I’m not that anal really, it’s just this little quirk that annoys me. Actually I find it kind of hilarious. I mean, I’m not really one to be pointing fingers as it is, obviously my grammar and punctuation aren’t beyond reproach or anything. The thing is I know how to do it right, I’m just too lazy to bother. Or chalk it up to artistic license. Whatever.

Since I’ve been in New Zealand though, I’ve noticed TONS of examples of this particular mistake. Just everywhere - menus, signs, billboards, magazines, you name it. I don’t wanna start any sh!t now, I’m not saying it’s a cultural thing, hell I don’t know. I’m just sayin’.

So I’m explaining this to my friend and trying to think of a good example, and my brain just totally craps out on me. I couldn’t remember one to save my life. So I joked that I would start a blog about it, and then completely forgot about it, of course. That is until just a minute ago when I was skimming through Meebo’s wiki, and this just leapt right out at me:

btw, so far so good with SP1. I haven’t noticed any significant improvements or anything, but I haven’t noticed any problems either.

Quicktime Alternative seems to be ok so far. I did end up reinstalling it with MPC, and I may have to play around with it a little more. I don’t want to have to install a bunch of codecs but I haven’t figured out just what I need yet.  I think the only thing I really need to use Quicktime for is watching movies in SecondLife. Granted, we don’t do it very often and the quality is pretty mediocre but it’s the only way I’ve found so far to watch whole movies together, and the selection and price beats the other options like Amazon Unbox or Cinema Now. It just irks me to have install or hang on to more (questionable) software I hardly ever use. If anyone has a better solution I’d love to hear about it. Uhm…that is if anyone actually reads this, which part of me hopes no one ever does, lol.

But first things first: Skype still sucks even without the PM Manager. The cpu usage wasn’t as bad actually, there was a noticeable difference, but the video quality today was just such sh!t and I’m just so over it. Looks like I’ll be taking SightSpeed for a spin sooner rather than later.

So. Digsby. I was happy to learn it has voice and video calling. I don’t know why I thought it wouldn’t, I guess I just didn’t notice any mention of that in all the stuff I read. Haven’t had a chance to try it out though, I’d need to work on bf a little to convince him to dl a new client, lol. It looks pretty good, but the windows are pretty small and can’t go full screen as far as I can tell(?).

Overall I thought the interface was allright. I didn’t really like any of the skins but at least you’ve got some choices, it’s a huge improvement on Yahoo Messenger. Seems to use less memory than Yahoo, but it’s still a little bit of a hog, like I expected. How could it not be when it’s got me signed into YM, 4 email accounts, MySpace and Twitter? (Hell, I hadn’t logged into MySpace in like months, must be one of those “because I can” things.)

Digsby is the first multiprotocol im app I’ve used and I guess it’s the only one with the social networking stuff (MySpace, Facebook, Twitter) which has got a lot of folks excited. It’s got everything you need right there, for example you can see the latest tweets and status updates, you can tweet from it of course, just one right-click for links to your profiles, inboxes, etc, including links straight to compose new, which I liked. I think it’s a great idea, but I wonder if I really need all that. I’m trying to streamline things now and this would be great if I had a lot of contacts on other im clients, but for that I can use something lighter like Pidgin or Meebo (no download=win). It’s nice to be in all my email accounts at once but all Gmail (except for the Yahoo but I’ll ditch that one soon) and my Gmail Firefox extension takes care of that. I’m not heavy into any of the social networking sites, the features are neat but not really useful for me.

My conclusion: I think Digsby rocks. For all it does it doesn’t overwork my system, and it’s a great way to get all your eggs in one basket (or something like that). If i was still in high school I’d be all over this. Or maybe if I had more friends. Uhm. But it’s more than I need or can make use of right now. So in the spirit of simplification, out it goes. Sorry Digsby. It’s not you it’s me.

I’m slowly but surely migrating from Yahoo to Google for my email, but what I REALLY need is a better app for video calling. I’m still using Yahoo for the most part, or at least to start calls…the audio quality takes a dive anywhere from 2 seconds to half an hour into the call but it ALWAYS happens sooner or later. Between that and the intermittent freezing up of the video feed on both ends, midway through a conversation one of us will end up saying, “Screw this, let’s go to Skype.” Half the time YM just freezes up completely, forcing me to kill the program anyway.

But Skype…oh man, Skype. I mean, it’s no secret that Skype’s a huge resource hog. For me it’s not so bad on a straight voice call, at least it’s only around 20% of the time the connection is absolute crap, but it doesn’t run my cpu into the ground the way it does in a video call. I’m talking about 100% maxed out, nothing loading, system spazzing out…until eventually the whole thing just locks up and it’s reboot time.

Part of me would love to ditch both forever. I sure can’t take the bouncing back and forth any longer. It won’t be too hard let go of Yahoo. I will miss the games though. And all the emoticons (oh be quiet). But I do still rely on Skype for regular calls and voicemail. I really wish they would just get their sh!t together. What have they been doing the past like…5 years? I mean, what the HELL people? </rant>

So I did some digging around for other voip apps and tips. My conclusions and what I’ve changed so far:

Went ahead and chucked Yahoo messenger for Digsby (but if that’s too bloaty I’ll go with Pidgin instead).

Uninstalled and reinstalled Skype, making sure to hit that options box under the “do you agree” bit and uncheck the PM manager. I never realized it was optional, but that’s the damn thing that’s always eating up the most of my system, so I’m hoping this will make a huge difference. Otherwise, SightSpeed sounds promising. It is slightly more expensive for the pro services, but it sounds like it more than makes up for it in video quality. I’ll probably download the free one soon anyway, just to compare.

And then I was kind of on a roll, so I ran CCleaner, then I cleaned up my programs folder, and then…

I finally got rid of QuickTime, hooray! I found QuickTime Alternative - the same codecs but lighter without the rest of Apple’s crap. Well, that’s what they say. I’m still a little skeptical but hey, R-day is coming so I’ll give it a go. I didn’t install Media Player Classic with it though, so I don’t know if I’ll have to get their other codec pack to use with my media player. Which is kinda up in the air right now because I am DONE with Windows Media Player and Real Player (and you better not even mention iTunes around me). But that’s another can of worms…

Well, Windows Update never did fetch SP1 for me. I checked everything again and I still can’t find a reason the damn thing won’t come. Probably something simple and obvious. I finally just went ahead and downloaded the standalone monster…434mb. Sheesh. I figured I’d take it for a testdrive before the big Reformat that’s happening “soon.” I’m pretty sure my system is beyond hope at this point but I keep delaying the inevitable because when else do I get a chance to play with freeware, apps and junkwarez to my heart’s content? That last binge on pizza and ice cream before the new diet, if you will. And beer, and cupcakes, and nachos…

So, anyway…it’s backup time. Yeah, yeah, I’ll set up Syncback or something on the next install. The one where I do everything right. Or at least blog it all so I can track my f*ups.