Quick Review - Windows Messenger Live

So MSN Messenger suddenly started complaining that there was a new update available, and eventually I gave in and installed MessengerLive.

I haven't used it yet (I've only had it installed for about 5 minutes), but I'm trying to get it set up the way I like it. The first thing I did was install MsgPlus, since it adds a lot of extras (and I know it's gotten a lot of bad press recently, but it's really unjustified).

MsgPlus used to disable the ad at the bottom; it doesn't seem to do that any more. I find the ad really annoying, for three reasons: (1) it uses a lot of screen real estate; (2) it's distracting when it changes; and (3) in some countries, we actually pay per KB downloaded, and I don't really want to pay for someone else's adverts.

Screen real estate is the big issue, here; I like to have my msn contact window open most of the time, on the corner of my screen. But I want to see my contacts, not all the other gumph. If I want to add a contact, I can do it from a menu; I don't do it often enough to need a button on my contact window. Searching my contacts... maybe. But if I want to search the web, I'll do it via my browser. I don't need to see my display picture; I know who I am. My status I want to see, and my personal message. But I don't want an email button; I don't want two Windows Live related buttons; and I don't change the colour scheme often enough to need a button rather than a menu item. And if I have sharing folders disabled, I don't need an icon for it, surely? I realise that other people may have different needs; but why not make the display of these elements configurable?

And my biggest complaint: the window title can't handle being in a small window; instead of truncating, it just gets squished up really small and distorted. Which is pretty pathetic, and indicates that MS think you want your msn contact window to take up half your screen.

So I'm annoyed that I had to upgrade. The new version doesn't add any functionality I want; it uses up a lot more screen real estate; and the old version worked just fine, until it started nagging me about a new version being available. Typical Microsoft.

Update: Ah ha! A quick google turns up APatch, which does exactly what I want. All the things I listed above, and more!