Friends appear offline on my list..but they are online to IM but I cant see when they are online..why?

a lot of the time are invisible to every one and have to fix it them selves.

because they don't want you to see them.

it can be for two reasons: 1) they have blocked you i.e put u in the ignore list 2) they have chosen the "appear offline" mode . REMEDY: dont talk too much with your friends that they get fed up with u :)

One of the reasons,they probably have chosen to be logged in as invisible either to everyone or just you. To accomplish the ,latter use the stealth settings under contacts in the YM window. Click on each contact and you have 3 options. Maybe, the option to appear offline to only you; was used. .Or under messenger, on their status, they marked themselves busy, stepped out or not at my desk. These are conditions that you don't see them online. Under My Account locate your public profile. There is a box that you can check , if you don't want that yellow icon to appear everytime you're online. Maybe they exercise that option. Moreover under messenger, there's also an option which can be used on a temporary basis. Locate the Show/ Hide and choose which option. Another possibility is that they have you on their ignore list. Go to Messenger and under preferences, locate the Ignore List. Choose the option to ignore only the people listed below. Click, add their ID to the list.,then,click ignore and then ok. You can ignore up to 100 contacts. For people who are not listed in your mess list. Click on option Ignore anyone who is not in my mess list. For friends who are not listed on your YM list. On the IM window itself; locate the ignore icon, way over to the right. Click on this and that contact is ignored. But a word of caution. Even if these friends are listed on your YM list.; you'll still see this icon if they were not invited to join for IM. . Make sure these friends were invited to be listed on your messenger list, So you can see that yellow icon next to their name when they are online. I think I covered all the possiblities. A impt solution to this is,send them an IM or call their computer. Or send an e-mail and ask what's the big idea.

they sign in as invisible so rather than delte someone they dont like they can pretend they arent there. so if they ask y didnt u IM me its cause they were "offline"