way to load multiple instances of some programs?
 

is there any sort of standard way you can get a bunch of the same program runnings, for example if i wanted to run 3 aims, once its already running, it wont load it again.
ive seen some program-specific things that do this but im wondering if theres any sort of little trick you guys might know that lets you do this

There's no standard way, on Windows at least. I can't speak for Linux or BSD. But you should be able to open up an AIM chat window for each individual chat you're doing.

sometimes renaming the executable, hacking the program to change the windows titlebar etc, depends on the method they use to detect the already running process

often if you can't run it twice, its simply because the program can't run more than once.

download more than one aim-clients on to your pc.

like a client called trillian (works with all the IM's).

you can use your regular aim to log in using one account and use trillian to log in using another (u can even chat to yourself using these 2 prog's).

as for generally running 2 programs, no idea.

Speaking of Trillian, one of its features is that you can have multiple instances of the program running. I am not sure if other programs you can use instead of AIM also offer this as I don't use them. Maybe users of those programs can say.

Also, in Trillian (if you get the pro version) you can have multiple accounts signed on to any service. For example, I have a work and personal screen name for AIM, at home, I only sign onto the one, at work, I sign onto both, using only Trillian. And the logging is rather nice.

As for other programs, it all depends, some people mentioned installing a 2nd copy, or renaming the exe. Some programs have cracks/patches available that remove or step over the bit of code that looks for an running copy of itself.