On Saturday lunchtime, I got accepted for Google Wave while I was dining in Frankie and Benny's in Scunthorpe for lunch (I dont recommend the Chicago Grinder calzone - it would probably be nice if it wasnt drenched in the overpowering barbecue sauce).  The email was from 'wave-noreply' which I thought might be a spam email at first, however the email itself said the following:

Google	wave
	preview

Thank you for signing up to give us early feedback on Google Wave. We're happy to give you access to Google Wave and are enlisting your help to improve the product.

To accept your invitation, sign into Google Wave at the following link*:

https://wave.google.com/wave/invite?a=pre&wtok=2abd22e061ae66b6&wsig=ABk8uhRwLE3YRWqqEZELeP5r0Saiq2GV6g

(If you do not have a Google account, you will be prompted to create one)

Once you've signed in:

Check out the videos and example waves Invite others to join you

Happy waving!

The Google Wave Team

For help, please visit http://www.google.com/support/wave

* This link will only work for one invitation to Google Wave, it cannot be shared!

Copyright 2009. Google Inc, 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043.

When I clicked on the link, the first screen I got to said "Google Wave – Please install Google Chrome Frame,

To use Google Wave in Internet Explorer you need to install the Google Chrome Frame browser plugin: Or, you can use one of these browsers: Google Chrome, Safari 4, Firefox 3.5

If you want to continue at your own peril, go ahead."

Now this instictively goes against the cross platform, open source ethos that I have come to expect from google. While I can accept that the application probably places large demands on javascript resources, you should not have to expect to install plugins or change your default browser to use a social networking site. All other web 2.0 sites run fine in most modern browsers (although facebook is starting to clog up my IE8 installation when it has a large page).

So, I clicked on the 'if you want to continue at your own peril' link. This I assume is what most people will do anyway.

Heres the first screenshot of my google wave account: