Davao Mac User

Macworld gives the Yahoo Messenger app for the iPhone and iPod touch a generally good review (four mice out of five), with the reviewer praising the app’s ability to share photos, archive conversations, and being able to remain active for 10 minutes after switching to another app or taking a call. Yahoo Messenger can’t run in the background just like any other app because of the limitation in the current iPhone OS. The upcoming iPhone 3.0 OS will solve this with push notification.

The app can also be used to sign up for an account in case you don’t have one yet.

I do have some quibbles with some of the reviewer’s complaints:

1. Can’t chat over video: the iPhone doesn’t even have video capability (yet). Kind of petty to complain about a missing feature when the device itself doesn’t support it.
2. No support for any other instant messaging clients: Yahoo does have the prerogative to offer a service catering to its users only. They don’t need to support other IM services. This is not Adium we’re talking about here.
   

His other complaints are less petty and seem valid (non-animated emoticons, social network integration, and history sync between the desktop version and mobile app). Yahoo might add these later on.

I have the Yahoo Messenger app on my iPod touch but I don’t use it often. The fact is, I’m not doing IM much these days. Right now, my preferred method of communication is Plurk and to a lesser degree, Twitter.

Still waiting for the official Plurk API for a better iPhone/iPod touch app.

Related posts:

1. 23 Twitter apps for the iPhone/iPod touch reviewed
2. iPhone 3G more expensive than iPhone 3GS in new Globe pricing scheme
3. iPhone OS 3.1 update released
4. MobileMe iDisk iPhone app released
5. Adium ready to do video chat (soon)