its because MSN is the most popular chatting client around, so ofcourse it will be congested now and then this never happens to AIM or ICQ, why? cuz they s***ted up their clients with ads, and bloated it up to s*** ( hence AOL ) MSN adds advertisements if you want the email notification, but i guess it is better that you have a choice... i sometimes have a problem here and there, but hey, what are forums for :assshake