> ...I was in high school and before buying one it was very stressful knowing there might be emails I really need to respond to asap

that's an interesting anecdote. it was the opposite experience for me. friends and i had yahoo and hotmail emails back then but no one cared about sending emails or replying to them.

yahoo messenger and msn messenger were the reason those were created. i can't recall anyone stressing about it because the person you'd be messaging was with you most of the time...