My husband usually would always be on away. Usually because he may sign on messenger but there's a very good chance he's on the internet to do other things than talk.

Yeah, I guess people figure if you sign on no matter what, you're there to talk. That's why I just go appear offline when I don't want to talk, because it seems that no one accepts that a person on busy may be busy, or a person away may be away.

What's even better though, is that when my husband would be on Away, he'd have a message next to his name like "Sleeping" and then turn off the sound and the monitor and then when we wake up, he turns it on and has like 6 million messages. Do they not think he's sleeping?

That's one reason I like AIM, because it will tell how long someone's been idle. With MSN they could go "Well I didn't know when you went to sleep" but on AIM you could just go "Dude, it says "I'm sleeping" not only that but I've been idle for 8 hours, that means I haven't touched this computer for 8 hours, seriously do you think I was going to respond."

With MSN, there is no idle time, so people just naturally assume your on, even if you say you're not near the computer or anything. I think all messengers should incorporate the idle timer because it makes things less of a hassel.