My Yahoo Chat Rooms are working

I was having this problem lately, I was unable to properly chat in chat rooms because each time I entered I saw nobody else chatting even though there were people present in the room. I had to use Yahelite to finally be able to actually chat with people inside the rooms.

Since I don't like to give up on Yahoo [messenger] I tried again to enter the chat rooms with messenger and this time, it actually worked. I didn't change anything from last time but for some reason I was able to chat with people! I had almost forgotten what it was like, the bots, the bots, the bots, the guys looking for c2c (cam-to-cam) chat and the bots.


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No Chat Rooms for Yahoo messenger Vista

Why I would not use Yahoo! messenger for Vista even if I had Vista on my computer.

Did you know that the Vista version of Yahoo! messenger does not have chat rooms, webcam or message archiving? I could live without webcam really but no chat rooms and no message archiving! That's inconceivable. How could they even come up with a messenger that does not allow message archiving?

You can see a side-by-side comparison of all the current Yahoo! messenger versions here.

The XP versions (8 and 9) are the ones with the most features, in fact the only feature the XP version lacks is the Tabbed IM Windows.

Hopefully for people using Windows Vista you don't have to use the Vista version of Yahoo! messenger, you may still use the version 8 or 9 that work on Vista as well.

RIP Yahoo Messenger 5

I've used the version 5 of Yahoo! Messenger for a very long time, it was probably the first version of Yahoo messenger that I had ever used. I became a bit of a chat addict as some of my online friends can tell you. Yahoo! Messenger 5 was the perfect tool to keep me hooked on chatting with random strangers and making friends on the internet.

Then came the version 6 which introduced stealth settings, a revolution! Then came version 7, I don't remember anything about it but I'm pretty sure there was one and then the version 8 which allows Yahoo! Messenger users to add MSN contacts, a sign of things to come maybe.


Nowadays you can no longer access Yahoo chat with the version 6 of Yahoo messenger, even worse, Yahoo has retired its version 5 completely. They killed my favorite Yahoo messenger version without a proper funeral. Rest in peace version 5. You will be missed at least they can't blame you for the decline of the Yahoo! Chat rooms.

Yahoo chat rooms or free chat with bots

Back in August, Yahoo! decided to use word verification also called captcha, in order to fight bots in Yahoo! Chat. I suppose it was the most trivial solution available to them. It's a big annoyance to have to enter the distorted word each time you go to a room. It's a nightmare for room hoppers like myself.

If you regularly go in to one room or only a the same few rooms all the time then you shouldn't mind the captcha. When Yahoo first rolled it out, the rooms were emptier cleaner. And the common chatter was wondering what bot creators are doing now that captcha was keeping their bots from invading Yahoo! chat? Well they were getting prepared to fight back. Once they found a way around the captcha they must have praised Yahoo!'s name for allowing them to be even more present in the chat rooms than they've ever been in the past.

There were days when you would quickly change rooms when the one you landed in happened to be occupied by bots only. Now before you get into a room you say a quick prayer hoping that you wont land in a bot-only room. Because you fear having to go through captcha again, again and again before you feel tired of trying to chat and never being able to actually do it.


To know how the Yahoo chatters feel about the change read the comments to a blog post announcing the captcha on the Yahoo! messenger official blog. I also left a comment there. If you don't want to leave my blog for the Yahoo messenger blog (I love you!) here's the comment I left there

"The latest commenters have summarized what Yahoo! chat room users have been experiencing, inconvenience with the captcha and annoyance with bots. Word verification is never fun but people accept to go through it when they feel that it’s helpful in fighting spam. Real people have to endure word verification every single time they want to go in a room (and not just once while entering Yahoo Chat which is how I think it should work), added to that they still have the same problem with bots. I didn’t like the captcha solution when the bots hadn’t yet found a way around it but since most chatters felt better to have clean rooms I cheered with them thinking the days of bot filled rooms were over. Unfortunately it’s not the case and I think that with the current situation there are two factors driving people away from Yahoo chat, the bots and the word verification. As I like to say, I’m a room hopper, when I chat I like to go from room to room doing that with the captcha is discouraging to say the least."

Image taken form blog.messenger.yahoo.com

Spammers and Yahoo

I saw this message after login into Yahoo messenger a few days ago, it was an offline message.
[yhelper_affiliates: Hi, mjasmin_ht This is an automated message from Yahoo! We invite you to take a look at one of our new affiliate sites. http://www.super-shack.com]

When you type the url, it redirects you to this other address http://software.electricaudit.com/. The spammer pretends to be Yahoo and invites me to an affiliate site. Of course this makes no sense at all. The only time Yahoo had invited me to anything was while I was surfing their sites. They would never send me an anonymous instant message only to ask me to visit a website which is not even theirs -it's not a [sitename].yahoo.com website-. Besides, Yahoo knows my name and if they ever had to address me a message they would use it and not just my ID. The point I'm trying to make is this, examine messages when you receive them and you should be able to detect spammers easily. The sad part about this is that Yahoo doesn't seem to be doing anything to fight the amount of spam that the Yahoo messenger users have to deal with, even when the spammers use Yahoo's name.

I copied the urls for information purpose only, visit them at your own risk, don't say I didn't warn you. It's yet another chat-detectives web page , they are trying to sell you a bunch of "software". Don't buy anything from them, please.

Even though they claim to be affiliated with Yahoo in the instant message they have this notice at the end of their web page: " Yahoo! , the Yahoo! logo, MSN, the MSN logo, Windows and the Windows logo are registered trademarks of Yahoo! Inc, MSN and Windows. These programs are in no way affiliated with or endorsed by Yahoo! Inc, MSN or Windows. " Don't tell me you still need proof that those people are dishonest.

Here are more messages I've received from their bots:
plz_visit_chatdetectives.com_153: Ever wonder who your significant other talks to on Yahoo while you aren't home? Are they trustworthy or secretly having some type of online affair? Want to make sure your kids are not talking to someone questionable on Yahoo? If so we have the software solution for you. www.chat-detectives.com
plz_visit_chatdetectives.com_153: Ever wonder who your significant other talks to on Yahoo while you aren't home? Are they trustworthy or secretly having some type of online affair? Want to make sure your kids are not talking to someone questionable on Yahoo? If so we have the software solution for you. www.chat-detectives.com

Related posts:
More Spam via Yahoo messenger
Chat detectives strike again
Remember your public profiles


Join here and Chat for FREE without spam or bots

Remember your public profiles

After receiving one too many offline spam messages to one of my IDs that I never used in chat rooms, I had an epiphany. I finally realized one of the reasons those people where finding me is because I had too much information on display in my public profile. I had way more information than I thought, my full name, email, occupation etc... I removed most of it but people can still send me IM. Do you know how much personal information you have on your numerous internet profiles?


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Chat Detectives Strike Again