How greedy are your telecom providers?

Fri, 24 Mar 2006 15:07:13 GMT

This interesting little tidbit of information has been revealed, although kept fairly quiet. I wonder why, could it be that it portrays telecom carriers in a bad way? :)

According to industry sources, Microsoft has almost completely stopped offering solutions featuring MSN Messenger to handset makers after telecom carriers complained about the function undermining their revenues generated from voice and data transmission services.

Microsoft was actively promoting the MSN Messenger function to handset makers, but telecom carriers did not want the service to be included in the handset. If the application was to be offered, the telecom service providers wanted it to be an additional feature that they could provide and collect revenues on.

So, Microsoft is now offering the MSN Messenger service through telecom carriers, the sources said, adding the market will not see any new handsets with built-in MSN solutions in the near future.

Motorola recently launched two handset models with MSN Messenger – the V3x and Ming. But Tom Hsiao, president of Motorola Electronics Taiwan said today because of contract terms with Microsoft, the two models will be the only Motorola handsets to have the functions.

Sources with handset makers indicated that high-end and mid-range handsets using the Windows Mobile platform will not be affected by the Microsoft strategy change because the segment is a niche market and telecom carriers do not feel threatened by it. It is Java-based handsets that will be affected, the sources added.

For the full story, head over to :- http://www.digitimes.com/telecom/a20060321PR209.html

Basically they are saying that they want rid of messenger of cell phones so that people will continue to use SMS messages, whereby they collect 10 cents for evey message sent and received.

Something also worth noting is that America appears to be the only country whereby you get charged for both incoming and outgoing calls, messages etc. At least it's the only country I'm aware of.

As the saying goes, it's all in the name of capitalism.

Premium users get an update

Sat, 18 Mar 2006 18:06:11 GMT

Users of MSN Premium software were in for a suprise this week. Over the past few months there have been many rumors flying around with regards to the fate of MSN Premium and the MSN Client (MSN Explorer) software.

With what appears to be no development carried out on the MSN Client since the launch of 9.1 over a year ago, Microsoft this week, quietly and without any announcements, updated the client to version 9.2.

All current MSN Premium customers should already have the updated software installed as the update was carried out using the BITS background transfer.

If you navigate to C:\Program Files\MSN\MSNCoreFiles and open the Manifest.xml file, you should notice that the current version of your client software is 9.20.0026.0800.

A quick look in the C:\Program Files\MSN\MSNCoreFiles.New.{GUID} directory at the Manifest.xml file in there confirms that no further updates are expected at present.

There are reports in certain newsgroups that this latest build of the software is a bit unstable however so far I have not run into problems with it.

The big question however is what has been updated? One thing that was rumored to happen was the dependence of MSN Explorer with MSN Messenger being removed. Currently if you sign into MSN Explorer, you are also automatically signed into MSN Messenger, whether you want to or not. After a quick play with the new client I can confirm that this behaviour still exists in the 9.2 release.

I haven't had much time to play with the new release yet, but I will dig in, ask some questions and try to find out exactly what, if anything, this new release covers. At present it just looks like some bug fixes and security updates with no added functionality.

MSN and Windows Live: MSN

How greedy are your telecom providers?

Premium users get an update