I'm tired of ICQ's annoying ads with sound and it's general horrible, horrible, horrible interface/bugs/whatever

what's everyone's favourite ICQ alternative to speak with folks on the ICQ network?

thx :)

Good for you coders..IRC is the best alt. as of now...
Go make one.. :)

msn, steam or skype.

trillian

thanks now3p... didn't trillian change to something else though?

and you other guys missed the point -- I'm not looking to abandon ICQ, just abandon the ICQ software

wait what? ads?

Pidgin all the way man... pidgin is what i use, and is cross platform :) w00t it combines msn, icq, etc etc whatever in one nice package that is awesome

trillian or pidgin.

i don't see ads on icq but i use 2003b-version.

pidgin combines messengers which most of its users have never heard.

ICQ keeps making me update, it sux now

pidgin

i paid for trillian. but i gave up instant messaging.

my old icq doesn't want me to get it updated.

@Pang - it's Trillian and Trillian Astra now. I believe Trillian is something like the light version of Astra, but it's still fully functional with most messengers (and free).

I think Astra is something like $15, but it's worth every penny. I do EVERYTHING with my messengers (and occasionally IRC) through it, and it has some great chat tools. I used old Trillian several years ago, and this is a vast improvement on what it used to be. It's virtually bug/glitch free now, and operates much more quickly.

Pidgin is better! heh

I tried Pidgin. I can't necessarily say there was anything *wrong* with it....but I really just didn't like it for some reason I was never able to put my finger on.

ya, i'm in the same boat as now3p :p

i use pidgin on my mac, and I've never been that fond of it

i'll give the windows version a try

trillian is the best

http://www.trillian.im/ is that the correct trillian? think they've changed the web address since i last used it.

Years ago I was able to use a little free app, I think it was called Resource Hacker, to easily modify ICQ so the ads didn't show. Pretty sure that would still work - it simply allowed you to resize the ad frame to 0.

But yeah, I used to use Trillian and it was okay.

Yes Dibs - Cerulian Studios is the programming group that made it.

thanks, found my confirmation email for Trillian Pro, but it's on the other computer, and i think it referred to cerulianstudios.com or some such vaguely 1/2 remembered url.

yeah, I think they used to be cerulianstudios.com? They switched when they released Astra, I think

I've never tried the windows version of pidgin... just the linux version :) compiling from source ftw...