Toby, I completely agree about the superfluous nature of IM in an internal corporate setting. It makes perfect sense for real-time communication when one person is in Canada and another in Botswana, but when two people are in the same building, it just doesn't make sense -- financially or logically. Besides idle gossip to be kept on the downlow (when phone conversations can be heard by neighbours), I can't think of any good reason for it... I think IM is just another one of those IT acronyms that companies feel the need to include in their arsenal of communications tools simply to say, "Yeah, we've got that" as opposed to any real need. Some ex-colleagues used to IM each other everyday from about 20-feet away simply to say "It's lunchtime"... I got fed-up one day when I heard the blink-blink of their IM client and shouted over the partions "LUNCHTIME!!!". They don't talk to me anymore... I wonder why.