Meebo is What’s Wrong With Web 2.0

Someone has to say it. The idea of using the web as a complete application platform is a bad one. Google didn’t do the world any favors by making a kickass interface to GMail, mainly because all the me-too startups in the Silicon Valley feel it necessary to imitate, and they are doing a piss-poor job.

That being said, let’s talk about meebo.com. Meebo is a cute, lovable web-based IM client. Yes, that’s right - no longer do you have to go through the hassle of downloading AOL Instant Messenger, Yahoo Messenger, MSN Messenger, or Google Talk: you can just navigate your browser to their web site and use all of these services through a single, unified interface. It’s so innovative and convenient, clearly worth millions in venture capital. We’ll just pretend we never heard of Gaim or Trillian. Anyhow, the problem with Meebo, besides being an unoriginal hack, is that they have tried too hard to make the web into a complete application platform, to the point where they don’t even bother holding themselves to the same standards by which desktop application developers are judged. That, and their entire user base consists of students who are signing into AIM on locked-down lab PCs during class, instead of doing the work.

Technical Indiscretions

It has been said (by me) that what happens in Web 2.0 stays in Web 2.0. In AJAX development, programmers can’t be held responsible for, say, the amount of memory their giant JavaScript application uses, because hey, that’s the browser’s problem. We don’t care about the browser taking 100% of the user’s CPU to drag a window, because those Firefox & IE developers just need to get off their lazy asses and write a decent JavaScript interpreter. Well, I tell you what: if you develop desktop applications for Windows and your application uses 100% CPU when you drag a window - pack your shit, you’re going home. The user holds the developer responsible for shortcomings of the platform. The user doesn’t care that Firefox’s JavaScript interpreter runs in the same thread as the renderer, and that faulty JS can bring down the browser. The bottom line is, if the user comes to your application and Firefox crashes or starts eating memory, your application is at fault, not Firefox.

The Yardstick of Truth

So, with that in mind, let’s take a look at Meebo as if we were desktop application developers. If you load up Firefox and go to google.com, it takes up about 40MB of memory. If you sign into GMail, it uses about 50MB. Take your browser over to meebo.com and sign into AIM, that’s 61MB. Have a conversation with a friend? 69MB. Chat for a while with said friend? You’re up to 79MB. That’s right: if you use Meebo for a while, it will use 39MB of memory over Firefox’s base usage. Gaim, by comparison, uses 15MB consistently, when signed into Google Talk and chatting all day.

If you’re signed into Meebo, take one of your IM windows and drag it around a bit. On my dual-core, 3.4GHz workstation, this uses 90% CPU time. However, if I take the whole Firefox window and drag it around the screen, Firefox uses about 11% CPU and XOrg uses another 20%. A pegged CPU will draw more power, which uses more electricity, which requires more electricity to be generated, which, given the division of power generation in the United States, causes more carbon dioxide to be emitted into the atmosphere. So there you have it, by not caring about resource consumption, Meebo is destroying the environment and perpetuating global warming. My grandkids will thank you, Meebo.

But Seriously, Folks

There is no place in my heart for companies that rewrite desktop applications we’ve had for years as web apps, without offering any additional functionality, like GMail’s gigabytes of storage. It’s like 1998 all over again, but on a smaller scale. I should go out looking for some venture capital, I have a great idea: selling pet food over the internet for more than it costs in the store.

From http://www.uncov.com/