Windows Live Messenger Program Managers talk about Wave 3: LiveSide Interview Part 1 of 3

By Kip Kniskern on October 21, 2008 8:14 AM

2 comments

Today I ventured to Microsoft’s Red West campus to talk to three Windows Live Messenger Program Managers; Alton Kwok, Brian Moudy, and Marisol Ontaneda. It was great getting a chance to talk to them about Windows Live Messenger and Wave 3.

In this first part of the interview, I ask the three to introduce themselves, and then Alton starts off by talking a bit about contacts, pawns, and What’s New:

[View:http://video.msn.com/video.aspx?vid=8de04f6e-9516-4ffb-baee-30b4aa180346]

(about 7 minutes)

(here’s a link to the file, in case you want to download: just right click and “save target as”: Part 1 wmv )

I’ll have parts 2 and 3 up shortly, just don’t ask me about Soapbox or Expression Encoder anytime soon ;).

Posted in Interviews | Tags: Messenger, Wave 3

Comments

damaster

It’s good to hear they’ve taken account into accessibility issues with the “chiclets” and how they got around addressing that issue.
http://www.liveside.net/members/calum_2D00_r_2D00_/default.aspx calum-r-

Thank you very much for this nice surprise interview – it’s informed us of a bit more about Windows Live Messenger. e.g. the fact that there has been more features added after the beta ;)

Also, I like the fact you can turn off the status text in the contact list – i find that sometimes distracts away from the user’s Diaplay Name; especially when the colour of the chiclet or display picture frame is clear enough.

Finally, it’s good to see a move away from the Messenger ‘branded’ pawn, especially when the status is being displayed in Windows Live Mail (“for desktops”?) and hopefully on the online services too.

One thing I have noticed is that the icons on the Messenger IM control (e.g. the one used here on LiveSide) will need updating to replace the pawns with the chiclets! :P

Exciting times! (I just hope they hurry up & release the final versions of everything ASAP :D)

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