Comment 11 for bug 444170

This isn't really related to the indicator-applet, it is related to the session applet which can set your status. With empathy, the underlying telepathy framework has the ability to be "online" when the empathy client isn't running. The session applet can set your status to online. If it does that, and you receive a message it could then open empathy as a "handler" for incoming messages. I am not sure what status the session applet defaults to on login, but I suspect the last known state.

@Ted, can you clarify that?