Windows Live Profile, the service that essentially turns Windows Live into a non-isolated social network centered around your Windows Live ID, currently pulls in a good deal of updates from third-party services Flickr, Pandora, Twitter, Yelp, and a couple more. You can also insert any RSS feed into the streams, for instance the one for your own blog, and add it to the mix. In case you don’t remember, Windows Live Profiles was part of the big social roll-out Microsoft launched in December last year.
Microsoft refers to these streams as ‘Web Activities’ and displays update messages from contacts under the header “What’s new” on a variety of Live Services, like at the bottom of the new Windows Live Messenger interface for example, provided these users have given permission to share them either publicly or within their trusted network. I’m not 100% sure that includes the just released embedded Windows Live Messenger chat you can add to other websites, but I’m trying to figure that out.
Notably missing from the list of supported third-party service providers, particularly considering its ongoing business relationship, is Facebook. Especially now that the company has been placing much more focus on real-time status updates – supposedly as a result of Twitter envy – it seems like it belongs right there in the list of Web Activities for Live Services. And in fact, such an integration had been announced earlier this year, at CES in January, where Microsoft and Facebook said they would be creating more ties between their respective user bases (which are both considerably large) “in the coming months”.
Now, if this tweet from Marketing Manager for Microsoft Advertising Southeast Asia Geert Desager speaks the truth, we can expect Facebook feed updates to be added to Windows Live Profile’s Web Activities feature as soon as in April, possibly at the upcoming Web 2.0 Expo event in San Francisco.
April is only 2 weeks away, so if you were dying to get your Facebook status updates and photos shared to your contacts on Windows Live Messenger and Spaces automatically, you need to exercise only a little bit more patience.
(Note that the screenshot embedded at the top of the article depicts the Windows Live Messenger application on Facebook)
Testing Facebook connect…
Can’t you make a meaningful comment to test it?
No, he cannot.
This was inevitable, I created my Live Profile shortly after I discovered the ability to import my Facebook contacts to Live Messenger!
sick sick
Is this the sign of the future?
A prior Techcrunch post talked about Yahoo and Myspace. Now, Microsoft is inching closer to integration with Facebook. Is this a sign of the emergence of a triumpherate? Google, FaceSoft, and YaSpace?
Where does that leave the Long Tail?
wagging the dog?
Talking about Twitter envy, it’s very difficult for other companies to sit by and love twitter when twitter is taking all the love and attention from them. I doubt if any other company can rival twitter at the moment. It’s not going to happen, if you ask me – at least not right now.
Windows Live Profile and Facebook Connect… how the hell did that end up in a Twitter tale?
Hi,
My name is Ben Fryxell and I do the Mac podcast MacMania. I was wondering if I could have a review copy of Reunion to review on the show.
Thanks,
Ben