Archive for the ‘Messenger’ Category
Celebrating 25 Years of the Smiley!
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This year reportedly marks the 25th anniversary of the emoticon, a form of expression that has today become one of the most recognized symbols in digital communication.
First introduced in 1982, the smiley 
and his buddies have religiously added that much needed layer of expression to routine digital conversations. Emoticons have helped people better express themselves in otherwise impersonal conversations.
Jeff Bonforte, vice president, Yahoo! Messenger, said, “Nearly 85 percent of people using Yahoo! Messenger daily rely on emoticons to add color and character to their communication. Our users are the experts, and to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the emoticon, we are asking Yahoo! Messenger users to create the next generation of smiley faces.”
Commemorating the 25th anniversary of the emoticon, Yahoo! Messenger is conducting an ‘Emoticontest’, inviting consumers to submit their favorite expressions that will compete for the next set of emoticons.
Winners’ contributions (read: emoticons) will be featured on Yahoo! Messenger’s worldwide service.
As part of the celebration, Yahoo! has also conducted a survey of nearly 40,000 Yahoo! Messenger users to find out where and how emoticons play a role in everyday communication.
The survey threw up some interesting results. For starters, nearly 82 percent of those who use Yahoo! Messenger daily, use emoticons in their IM conversations.
Eighty three percent of respondents say that ‘happiness’ is the one most expressed emotion using emoticons, the other being ‘flirting’.
Over half of those surveyed find it easier to convey feelings of love through emoticons than in person. Fifty seven percent would rather express a ‘crush’ on someone using an emoticon. Only 10 percent would go so far as proposing marriage to their loved ones via IM.
From the respondents, as much as sixty-six percent have memorized text characters for three or more emoticons, while 19 percent have memorized text characters for over 10 emoticons.
And not surprisingly, those aged 19 to 25 years are the most avid users of emoticons.
Interestingly, nearly half (48 percent) of respondents over the age of 50 are using emoticons in their everyday communication.
Microsoft Launches Windows Live Hotmail Worldwide
Built from the ground up, the new Windows Live Hotmail is now safer, more powerful and available virtually anywhere.
Microsoft Corp. today announced that Windows Live™ Hotmail®, the successor to MSN® Hotmail, is launching globally in 36 languages. The most significant upgrade for Hotmail since it pioneered the webmail industry in 1996, the new service has been built to be a vast improvement over the previous Hotmail offering, having incorporated input from more than 20 million beta testers. Windows Live Hotmail will deliver a safer, more powerful and productive e-mail experience than previous versions with flexible access via the Web, on a mobile phone or with an e-mail client. Microsoft also announced that later this month Windows Live Hotmail customers will be able to access their Windows Live Hotmail e-mail and contacts for free* using Microsoft® Office Outlook® 2003 or Office Outlook 2007 via the new Microsoft Office Outlook Connector beta.
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| Inbox full view with reading pane |
| click for hi-res version See additional screenshots of Windows Live Hotmail |
As Windows Live Hotmail begins rolling out on May 7 and continues over the coming days, consumers will be able to visit http://www.hotmail.com to sign up for a new Windows Live Hotmail account. Current MSN Hotmail customers can also update their existing account to Windows Live Hotmail by logging into their account and clicking on the green Join Windows Live Hotmail button.
“We’re thrilled to deliver Windows Live Hotmail to the more than 280 million active MSN Hotmail accounts around the world,” said Steve Berkowitz, senior vice president of the Online Services Group at Microsoft. “Windows Live Hotmail represents an extremely compelling end-to-end e-mail experience that makes it easy for customers to get best-of-breed e-mail access across PCs, mobile devices and the Web. Windows Live Hotmail is a cornerstone online service for Microsoft and a critical part of our online advertising business because e-mail is a key point of influence for consumer purchases. We’re pleased to announce the launch of the service to advertisers in addition to consumers on the eve of the Microsoft Strategic Account Summit.”
Millions of pieces of customer feedback played an instrumental role in the development of the look and feel of the new Windows Live Hotmail. Key customer benefits include the following:
Access: Hotmail, Where You Want It
Today’s Windows Live Hotmail customers don’t necessarily sit behind a computer screen all day; they want flexibility for their busy lives. As a result, Microsoft has developed new technologies to meet their needs:
| • | Outlook Connector. Available later this month in 11 languages worldwide, the new Microsoft Office Outlook Connector beta will enable people to view and manage their Windows Live Hotmail account from Outlook for free, with full contact, e-mail and e-mail folder synchronization. |
| • | Mobile. Using Windows Live Hotmail for mobile (http://mobile.live.com), customers can access their e-mail when they are on the go on a Web-enabled mobile phone or PDA. In the future, Windows Mobile® customers will receive a richer online and offline Windows Live Hotmail experience with Windows Live for Windows Mobile, which will ship with Windows Mobile v6. |
| • | More to come. In the coming weeks, Microsoft will introduce an additional e-mail client option for Windows Live Hotmail with the release of Windows Live Mail beta, a free consumer e-mail client available via download that will be a successor to Outlook Express and Windows Mail on Windows Vista™. |
Productivity: The Power of Desktop Software With Your Personal Web E-Mail
E-mail speed and reliability are critical to consumers. To help maximize productivity in e-mail, Microsoft is offering new features, including the following:
| • | More like Outlook. With right-click and drag-and-drop capabilities, preview pane customization and auto-complete addressing, all designed for optimal productivity, Windows Live Hotmail looks and feels more like the Outlook software millions use at work every day. |
| • | More Windows Live services. Windows Live Messenger presence is built into Windows Live Hotmail so customers can see from their inbox if their Messenger contacts are online. If a contact is online, customers can begin a conversation with the contact directly. |
| • | The space customers need. Microsoft remains committed to providing Windows Live Hotmail customers with all the storage space they need to remain productive in e-mail. With an inbox storage size starting at 2 GB, Windows Live Hotmail will continue to grow its storage capacity to meet customer needs. |
Protection: Safety Made Simple
According to feedback from customers, e-mail safety is one of the most important things to them. Windows Live Hotmail is designed to help protect customers before potentially harmful e-mail messages make it into their inbox, and helps them make better, more informed decisions about the safety level of their e-mail. These are some of the new safety features:
| • | Safety bar. When an e-mail message arrives in the Windows Live Hotmail inbox after multiple safety checks, the safety bar at the top of each e-mail message will give a visual cue of the status of the e-mail: white indicates the e-mail is from a known sender, yellow indicates the e-mail is from an unknown sender and red indicates the e-mail is potentially fraudulent. |
| • | Improved spam protection. With one click on the “mark as unsafe” link, customers can automatically delete junk e-mail messages, block any future e-mail messages from that junk e-mail sender, and report the junk e-mail sender to Microsoft’s spam filters to help protect others. |
Personalization: Control Your View
As a direct result of customer feedback, Microsoft is providing Windows Live Hotmail customers with more control over the look and feel of their e-mail.
| • | Two views. Customers can choose how they view their Windows Live Hotmail. The classic version looks similar to MSN Hotmail for those who prefer the familiar look, while full version works more like Outlook with more advanced functionality. |
| • | Color choice. Customers can make their Windows Live Hotmail inbox their own with a choice of color themes. |
Yahoo Offers Chat With No Downloads Attached
Yahoo has put its Messenger program on the Web, allowing users to chat on the application without downloading software into their computers. While Yahoo certainly isn’t the first to put chat on the browser, the announcement is important due to the sheer number of Yahoo chat users: 88.5 million, according to the company, which named Southeast Asia as a major focus of the initial rollout.
Yahoo (Nasdaq: YHOO) 
has introduced a new version of its popular Yahoo Messenger instant messaging service that eliminates the need to download and install software. Still in the beta phase, the new “Yahoo Messenger for the Web” is browser-based.
That means Yahoo Messenger users can log in to chat on any computer or other device with Web access, including PCs at companies that forbid software downloads. The new application is “the first brand-new Messenger in over six years,” noted Jeff Bonforte, vice president of product development for Yahoo Messenger, in his blog.
Yahoo is far from the first Internet player to offer a Web-based instant messaging service — AOL, Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) , Meebo and eBuddy are among the competitors. However, the announcement is important due to the sheer number of people who use Yahoo Messenger: 88.5 million, according to Yahoo, a number that grew substantially last year when Yahoo and Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) 
announced interoperability between Messenger and Windows Live Messenger, Microsoft’s IM product.
Chat Lite
The new Yahoo chat client differs from most other Web-based clients in that it is based on Adobe Systems’ (Nasdaq: ADBE) Flash. It works with most Web browsers and operating systems.
While it lacks some of the bells and whistles found on the downloaded version (such as file transfer capability), Messenger for the Web includes tabbed windows that simplify multiple, simultaneous chatting. It also allows users to save their chats on Yahoo servers for later search and access.
Getting the (Instant) Message
“Essentially, the Web-based IM adds to the platform of providing their services to anyone, anywhere on any device, so that’s kind of where they are really steering Yahoo,” IDC research analyst Rebecca Swensen told TechNewsWorld. “They want to provide a communication platform people can really use in any way they think works best for their situation.”
Web-based IM clients are particularly useful for people who don’t own personal computers or work at places that disallow the downloading of applications onto company machines, noted Swensen. “To be able to provide that service to those users, where they can connect to the Yahoo client and be able to talk or message to users they know, kind of opens the door to other possibilities as far as how users can use the Yahoo platform,” she said.
“Southeast Asia is a primary focus in the initial roll-out with its large and increasing Internet penetration of approximately 70 million Internet users … despite limited personal PC ownership in those countries,” said Yahoo in announcing the product.
The Unification Continues
The Yahoo effort demonstrates a general trend toward omnipresent means for communication, said Art Rosenberg, an analyst in the field of unified communications for the group Unified View.
“The whole idea of making services much more device-independent and, to some extent, client-independent just means people can communicate with anyone no matter where they are and what they’ve got,” Rosenberg told TechNewsWorld. “It’s interoperability. That’s what the (landline) telephone was. I could call anybody. I didn’t care what kind of phone you had. That’s what is happening with messaging.”
Yahoo Messenger for the Web will be available in multiple languages including English, Portuguese, Vietnamese and traditional Chinese, said Yahoo.
Happier Yahoos
The move by Yahoo is an incremental step in an effort to gain user loyalty, according to Swensen. “This isn’t an explosive thing that’s going to take Yahoo to the No. 1 position,” she said. “It’s just another stepping stone to providing a communication platform for users, but it’s an important one because it brings into Yahoo users who don’t have easy access to the Yahoo platform.”
Communication providers are realizing that people want easy access to various types of communication, stated Rosenberg, because some situations benefit from voice while others are best served with e-mail , IMs or text messages.
“Some of the deficiencies of voice messaging are going to be overcome by text,” he said. “I don’t necessarily want to hear the tone of your voice. All the overhead of dealing with speech can be gotten rid of with text.”
