The Great Battle.

I have a problem, folks. See, I do love me a great chatroom, but I hate to actually have to download the chat onto my computer (this is why I dislike Skype so much). My alternative? Meebo.com has always been there for me when it counts. With their fabulous design and interface, you can combine all you favorites chats (Yahoo!, Gmail, Hotmail, FaceBook, AIM, etc.) in once place and log onto all of them at once. You also have a Meebo name, which allows you to chat with fellow members and (up until recently) join chatrooms. Meebo is also very easy on the eyes. You can change the background color/image and even the color of the pop-up windows to make your own scheme. Your font is also highly customizable, with several font choices and colors to choose from. But, sadly, Meebo has purged itself of all that is wonderful by destroying their chatroom option. You may no longer pop into any chat you want and instead must be invited to one by a fellow member.

Meebo's pretty design just can't make up for the absence of chatrooms.

In my desperation to talk to random strangers, I stumbled upon Teenspot.com, a site dedicated to all things teenagers love most. Chatrooms and flirting. I'll be the first to admit that Teenspot is not nearly as aesthetically pleasing as Meebo, but it does have its perks. You profile page is customizable, with the ability to add pictures and change the background and colors. The problem is that the chat itself might possibly be the ugliest thing I have seen in a long time. Though you can change the color of your font and the backdrop color, you can't change the font itself. This creates an environment that is much too uniform for my taste. There are many different chatrooms to choose from and the people are easy to get along with. Be careful though, many of the chats are dedicated to flirting. I don't do that over the internet, but hey, whatever floats your boat.

That's one ugly chat, Teenspot. But at least you have chats.

For me, the choice was easy. I had to have my chatroom fix. I still log onto Meebo, and even have an App for it on my iPod, but Meebo will just never be the same.