Advantages of our approach

Portability.

The user needs nothing but a Java enabled web browser to use the product.

Light weight.

The applet implements no functionality but user interface and connection to server, which makes it very light and easy to use on bandwidth limited platforms.

Privacy.

All communication with the ``outside world'' is being done by the server, which makes the user completely anonymous (in terms of revealing one's IP address).

Easy to extend.

Further functionality can be added to the system quite easily simply by adding more commands to the communication protocol. A change in platform (say to implement a client for AOL IM) can also be performed easily given the right library, as the client program is not dependent on the outside protocol.