None of the blog chat/ IM tools I’ve tried has worked so far — need to take the Yahoo button down at left because it doesn’t work.
The blogchat beta technically worked, but it took a multi-step process. Not only did you need to open a browser with your blog up, you needed to go to their site and log in with a password. Also, the sound notification feature requires flash, and I don’t have flash working in Mozilla. So you need to be looking at the window to see if someone is trying to talk to you. I’m never staring at a chat window, waiting for someone to talk to me! When I had it turned on, I missed people, and most of the time I never got around to turning it on during the day.
The Yahoo IM is easier. When your blog window is up and you’re live with IM, it shows that you’re available. But it doesn’t work. I never get the messages (if you tried to send me an IM I wasn’t ignoring you — I didn’t get the message).
If you’ve successfully troubleshot the Yahoo IM feature, please let me know.
I really like the idea of starting conversations with people who are reading the blog; wish I could get the tools to work.
(What is the past tense of troubleshoot by the way? Troubleshot? Troubleshooted? Debugged? Gotten the damn thing to work?)