New Windows Live Messenger unimpressive, VP in charge of Windows Live disappears! *UPDATED- 2*
UPDATE2: MICROSOFT- DON'T RELEASE BUGGY SOFTWARE AS AN OFFICIAL RELEASE! This stupid program crashes on me with near-clockwork regularity. Now I'm just plain irritated. This isn't a Beta version and I didn't expect it to perform like one. Even better, the damn thing installed itself over my old MSN Messenger installation (which I really wasn't expecting given it's Brand-New name) and I can't go back to using that... Whoopee. Oh and the offline chat feature that I was so in love with is totally broken! Half the messages I send my friends while I'm in offline mode don't get to them- and vice versa.
I can't un-recommend this program enough. Argh!!!
UPDATE: OOH FINALLY MESSENGER LET'S ME CHAT WITH PEOPLE WHILE I'M IN OFFLINE MODE!!! Yeah, ICQ had this feature like a decade or so ago so Microsoft is busy playing catchup, but I still really appreciate the feature. OK I'm a convert- if for that feature alone.
So I've been using the recently-released Windows Live Messenger client for the past few days and well, it's basically MSN Messenger with a new coat of paint. OK, it's got VoIP but... oh wait, MSN Messenger did voice chat too. OK OK, so Windows Messenger Live also lets you call normal telephones from your PC! Whoa! But oh wait, Skype already provides an excellent VoIP solution- and it runs on Mac OS X and Linux too! So there's that. Well, colour me totally unimpressed.
Also, what's the deal with this "Windows Live" branding thing? Who is Microsoft trying to fool? Windows is an operating system. Sticking it's brand-name on everything from the new version of Hotmail (speaking of which, dropping Hotmail- one of the Web's most recognizable brand names- for 'Windows Live Mail' is just plain stupid) to the new version of MSN Messenger is just going to dilute the Windows brand.
Stupefyingly enough, the VP in charge of marketing Windows Live mysteriously left Microsoft just after the release of the new Messenger client. Very bizarre, considering he was scheduled to give interviews about the program's release on the day he left! Just what is going on at Redmond these days? I hope these guys have a plan. I'm quite ambivalent towards MS these days, but the company has done so much to push computing into the mainstream over the past decade and a half that it's just downright sad to see them floundering like this now.
5 comments:
wow uve only used it for a few days. tsk tsk. i have been usin it ever since the beta started
oh n by the way ur really wrong of it being unimpressive..well atleast the beta was anyways. it totally blew me away when i found that there was a loop whole that allowed me to talk to all those lame a** bit**s that blocked me. well now i guess theyv fixed it. n by the way msg plus live is out. better go n get it
the beta started out almost 6 months ago. back then m$ didn know that the feature that enabled to talk in offline mode actually enabled ne1 that had a beta invitation to talk to ppl that blocked them. to me that was real cool but now as every1 will have WLM it wont work. n by the way either ur blind or somethin but..there are a heck of lot more features that that. not to mentions its much faster sign in
Thanks for your comments, TheDA. Well, I'm not really interested in the extra features included with Windows Live Messenger (same reason why I never got MSN Plus)- call me old-fashioned but the only thing I used instant-messaging clients for is to chat and send files. Offline mode is the only other feature that interests me. So far, the new Messenger hasn't been working too well for me- maybe it's my slow connection but MSN 7.5 sure worked better. I hope they release an update for WLM or a patch soon.
wow i never have all those probs with the live messenger. well unless u haven been keepin up with the times well m$ limited the offline talk mode cuz many ppl were takin advantage of the feature. i have n a-patched WLM running with msg plus live 24/7 n has never crashed on me not even once. there was only one WLM build that did crash n that was a long time ago, i think it was 8.0.0586 or somethin. n theres another handy feature u 4got to mention the folder sharing feature is a real jewel, now i cant possibly live without it. so i short, wat u experience might not happen for everyone else
Post a Comment