Miranda Instant Messenger is a good alternative for those who want multiple instant messaging protocols, but still want to stay small in size. Miranda is around 2.5MB, which is much smaller than Gaim. It does all the major protocols (AIM/ICQ, MSN, Yahoo, etc. It is extensible via plugins. You can download a .zip of the program that is already portable.
http://www.miranda-im.org/release/download.php
-Justin
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It's not for newbies, though. The interface is a bit convoluted. And it's hit-or-miss in getting it to work.
Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!
I've used Miranda for about two and a half years now and have had no troubles with it. On some networks, I have to change the port to connect to IRC servers, but other then that, it's flawless. Takes a lot of customization to get it exactly the way you'd like it though, so you're right to say it's not for newbies.
Rob Loach [Website] [Projects]
Most of the people here are pretty computer savvy, so I have no doubt that most of them could set it up.
-Justin
I never got it working with AOL. It isn't a network thing. And it always popped up error messages for networks I wasn't using. I'd play with it for about 15 minutes, get sick of it, and ditch it.
Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!
If it's over people's heads, then they should just use Gaim.
-Justin