text: msn/windows messenger seems to be permanently logged in in the background? msn messenger or windows messenger or both are behaving very strangely on this laptop.  in fact, i've started to see either of those two behaving very strangely on my tower computer too.  i can still get messenger windows (don't know if they're msn or windows messenger windows) even though in the system tray, no messenger is running.  and just now, i have had a chat window pop up from someone trying to chat even though messenger in the system tray is logged out and i need to log in to send anything!  in fact, the chat window i just mentioned says, "you cannot send a message because you are not logged in."   further strange things:  in the past i've logged into messenger only to have a popup window following saying, "you have been logged out of messenger because you've logged in elsewhere" (or words to that effect) indicating that some background process was already logged in.  i log out, and exit, the system tray messenger to get on with work, but still get chat requests coming in !! change your settings in msn messenger.  open msn messenger, click on tools, the select options.  select preferences tab, then uncheck  the following in general:  run windows messenger when windows start, allow windows messenger to run in background or uncheck all if you like.  that's should take care your problemo!  same deal for aol or yahoo messenger.