Whilst reading through the settlement between Real Network and Microsoft, I noticed an issue which will effect or maybe enhance MSN Messenger and the way interact with your contacts…
What other tangible things will consumers notice as a result of the new collaboration?
Users of MSN Messenger will be able to play music from the Rhapsody catalog of 1 million songs while chatting. And when using MSN Search to find music, consumers will be presented with the Rhapsody catalog.
If you don’t know what Rhapsody is, its like ITunes but the songs are free.
Read the full Details of the Microsoft-Real agreement article at CNET News.
As alexp2_ad (happy birthday!) posted on the forum, Microsoft and Yahoo! are set to go through with a landmark interoperability deal which will allow users from each IM network to communicate with each other via text and voice.
MSN Messenger 1.0 originally allowed access to the AIM network, but AOL continuously blocked MSN - quote from BetaNews:
In 1999, Microsoft connected its MSN Messenger client to AOL’s AIM network - without authorization. The move let to a cat-and-mouse game of AOL cutting off its new competitor and MSN re-establishing communication with each update. Microsoft eventually gave up and focused on improving its client.
This move is a great step forward, interoperability is becoming more and more sought after by users. Read more at BetaNews, Reuters or ZDNet.
Just months after the limit was doubled from 150 to 300, it has once again been doubled to a whopping 600 contacts. MSN is being very generous this year!
Instant messaging security firm IMLogic said on Monday that attacks on IM networks increased to record levels, multiplying by fourteen times through the first three quarters of this year.
“Over the past three months the nature of the IM threat has continued to evolve with increasing levels of sophistication and rates of infection demonstrated by IM worms and viruses,” IMlogic CTO Jon Sakoda said.
The report concluded that MSN Messenger has been the recipient of the lion’s share of attacks, accounting for 62 percent of reported incidents. 31 percent targeted the AIM client, and another seven percent were aimed at Yahoo! Messenger users.
Full article at BetaNews, sourced via BigBlueBall
Unlike previous versions of MSN Messenger, which exposed all lists, versions 5 and up only expose the contact list. Via the property MyContacts you have access to an IMessengerContacts object which holds a collection of IMessengerContact objects.
Continue reading ‘Accessing and utilizing the contact list’
