Inside Windows Live Messenger:

Hey Messenger users, Aaron here. We are seeing an issue where Messenger versions 8.1 and 8.5 are experiencing a technical issue that is causing a blank white box to appear in the conversation window. If you are the 9.0 beta you might be seeing an Office Logo. Believe it or not this is the same bug. The issue does not impact your ability to send and receive messages. We apologize for the inconvenience and are working hard behind the scenes to lose the box and the logo. Hang tight, it should be back to normal before you know it!

  posted by Aaron

We here at Windows Live love to create software that makes keeping in touch with your personal community fun and exciting. If you love to chat on Windows Live Messenger, use Windows Live Writer to post to your Windows Live Spaces page and post photos from Windows Live Photo Gallery then we have just the community for you.

We are looking for people to share their stories, tips or tricks, or product reviews of Windows Live with others. We’ll show the world what amazing things you can do with Windows Live.

You can start by taking this quick survey so we know where to get you plugged in.

Thanks for being part of our Windows Live community!

  posted by Dharmesh

Greetings Messenger fans –

As some of you noticed, we had a problem from Friday night to Saturday morning where our Messenger service was incorrectly blocking some legitimate IP addresses.  We sincerely apologize for any difficulties this caused our users.  And we want to thank those of you that reported this problem to us so that we could quickly fix it.  Because of your help, the incorrect block was only in place for a few hours. 

As you can imagine, we are very serious about our efforts to block virus, malware and other harmful URLs from being passed on to our users.  And we're continually working to improve this process so that we can keep our users safe without having a negative impact on your Messenger service.

There have been some pretty outlandish speculations on what happened so I'd like to give you some facts about our process for trying to block unsafe URLs and about what happened Friday night:

• There are a number of factors that can be used to determine whether a URL is potentially harmful: number of times a URL is sent, the frequency of the URL being sent, the number of accounts the URL is sent from, manually checking the URL, comparing with other "block lists", etc.
• When a URL is deemed harmful, a block can be instated for a specific URL (i.e. www.<domain>.com/<page>) or an entire domain (i.e. *.<domain>.com)
• This entire process for Messenger is managed by a 3rd party that is a Microsoft partner
• On Friday, Microsoft did not request to block any of the URLs that were accidentally blocked
• The blocks were made by our partner as a result of their process to block harmful URLs
• We are still investigating the specific reason our partner made these incorrect blocks and we will work with them to improve their process for detecting harmful URLs while not blocking safe ones

As always, we're open to feedback on how to make Messenger an even greater service.  And again, our apologies to the users that were impacted by this.

  posted by Dharmesh

Greetings Messenger fans –

I have a great follow-up to the recent news about an incredibly successful first year for the i’m Initiative. Windows Live Hotmail announced today that they are joining in on the i’m Initiative started with Windows Live Messenger.  This means that now you can use either Messenger or Hotmail (or both) and help raise money for the cause of your choice.  Check out Hotmail’s blog for the details. 

This means that for all you passionate i’m participants out there, now’s the time to double down and start having your email use help make a difference like it has with Messenger. 

New to ?  Then go to http://im.live.com to learn more.

  posted by Dharmesh

Greetings Messenger fans –

Let me first introduce myself as I’m new to MessengerSays. My name’s Dharmesh Mehta and I lead the Windows Live Messenger product management team. Although I’ve been a user for many years, I just joined the team that builds and delivers Messenger. It’s been a busy and interesting time as I’ve been learning a ton about the vast array of Messenger capabilities, features and initiatives – some of which I’d never seen before (for a cool game, check out Fishticuffs). So the reason I’m posting here today is to share progress we’ve made with what I think is one of our coolest initiatives.

Many of the things we build are geared at making Messenger better for you – our customers. However, this initiative is about a great thing that Windows Live Messenger lets our customers do for the broader community. The program I’m talking about is the i'm Initiative – where every time someone who has chosen to participate in the i’m Initiative has a conversation using Messenger, Microsoft shares a portion of our advertising revenue with the organization selected by the customer. We started this initiative a year ago, and we’re happy to report that thanks to the support of many great Windows Live Messenger customers, Microsoft has donated $1.3 million to ten of the world’s most effective social cause organizations.

Because of your enthusiasm, we’re also excited to announce that we will be continuing this program. And with no set limit on the amount donated to each organization, the more i’m conversations people have, the more money that goes toward addressing some of the world’s most urgent social issues.

That basic idea is that we believe every successful business has a responsibility to use its resources and influence to make a positive impact on the world and its people, and Windows Live Messenger is helping to further this commitment. The organizations currently involved in the i’m Initiative (and their emoticon codes) are the

• American Red Cross - ready to help, code = *red+u
• Boys & Girls Clubs of America - providing a positive place for kids, code = *bgca
• The Humane Society of the United States - saving animals = *hsus
• National AIDS Fund - fighting AIDS, code = *naf
• National MS Society - joining the MS movement, code = *mssoc
• ninemillion.org - helping 9 million refugee kids, code = *9mil
• Sierra Club - exploring and protecting the planet, code = *sierra
• StopGlobalWarming.org - stopping global warming, code = *help
• Susan G. Komen for the Cure - finding the cure, code = *komen
• UNICEF - helping kids survive, code = *unicef

There are of course many other organizations out there that are confronting our world’s urgent issues that we know people would love to see as a part of the i'm Initiative, and rest assured we’re researching others to add on in the future.

The i’m Initiative is currently open to all residents of the US and you can join at http://im.live.com. It’s completely free for you to join and use Windows Live Messenger, and it takes only a minute to get started. We’re also exploring possibilities for expanding the program internationally in the future, but for the time being this remains a US-only program.

Lastly, on behalf of all of the organizations involved in the i’m Initiative, a heartfelt thanks to all of you who have supported the effort. Just by doing what you do every day, you are making a difference. Keep it up!