Tonight the next major version of Yahoo! Messenger (9.0) was released. This release has been a long time in the making, with an extended beta period to help shake out as many bugs as possible. Check out the Messenger blog for the long list of feature improvements.
One unique addition is the Pingbox, a Flash widget you can embed on your blog, MySpace page, etc. Visitors to your site can use it to have an IM conversation with you directly, without the need for signing up or logging in. It should be a safe way to host anonymous conversations like this, not revealing your Yahoo ID or email address in the process. The Pingbox can be customized with various backgrounds, colors, and overall dimensions. A simple 240x180 instance looks like this:
Conversations from the Pingbox widget appear in your Messenger client as part of their own group, for example:
Creating a Pingbox widget in Movable Type 4.x is very simple:
- View an existing simple widget to copy the HTML markup
- Create a new widget and title it “Pingbox”
- Start with the copied HTML snippet, then insert the embed code from the Pingbox site (see this example showing the final widget code for my site)
- Save the widget
- Add the widget to the appropriate widget set and rebuild your site
The Pingbox should be a great solution for anyone looking to connect with their site visitors. It would also be a quick solution for small business wanting to offer a “live chat” customer support capability.
The latest tweets from 
I've started to use pingbox on my website. I had been using Meebo but you had to be logged into the Meebo website to use it. I had hoped that Yahoo would allow me to use the Yahoo Messenger Mobile to send and receive pingbox messages directly to my blackberry... but it appears that you must login using their desktop version of Y! Messenger before pingbox will allow messages to be originated from the embedded pingbox messenger on the website. When connected via the mobile version of Messenger, your pingbox will report that you are OFFLINE and will not allow users to communicate to you.
You can see my implementation of pingbox at my real estate website: http://www.searchlawrence.com/Homes_For_Sale_In_Lawrence_KS_Map_Search.php
It was very easy to get up and running other than not being able to use the mobile Messenger application.
Tanya Kulaga
www.SearchLawrence.com
my PingBox shows me as offline on blogger ! What can I do? Please help ! It is also on... and yahoo won't help :| Thank you 1
I've just published my blog, but can't get Blogger to allow me to embed the Pingbox code into the 'Add a Gadget' area.
Any help for this newbie?
Solved it! I just copied your widget template, inserted my embed code, and... VOILA!
Thanks for the info.
Grrr -- it worked at first. Then I attempted to move the embed code and now it not only doesn't show up, but I can't even save it!
Help!!!!