The
.NET Messenger Service (formerly
MSN Messenger Service and sometimes called
Windows Live Messenger Service) is an
instant messaging and
presence system developed by
Microsoft in 1999 for use with its
MSN Messenger software and used today by its current
instant messaging clients,
Windows Live Messenger and
Microsoft Messenger for Mac. Third-party clients also connect to the service. It communicates using the
Microsoft Notification Protocol, a proprietary instant messaging
protocol. The service allows anyone with a
Windows Live ID to sign in and communicate in real time with other people who are signed in as well.
Background
Despite multiple name changes to the service and its client software over the years, the .NET Messenger Service is often referred to colloquially as "
MSN," due to the history of
MSN Messenger. The service itself was known as
MSN Messenger Service from 1999 to 2001,
at which time, Microsoft changed its name to
.NET Messenger Service and began offering clients that no longer carried the "MSN" name, such as the
Windows Messenger client included with
Windows XP, which was originally intended to be a streamlined version of MSN Messenger, free of advertisements and integrated into Windows.
Nevertheless, the company continued to offer more upgrades to MSN Messenger until the end of 2005, when all previous versions of MSN Messenger and Windows Messenger were superseded by a new program,
Windows Live Messenger, as part of Microsoft's launch of its
Windows Live online services.
Currently, the official name for the service remains .NET Messenger Service, as indicated on its official network status web page,
though Microsoft rarely uses the name to promote the service. Because the main client used to access the service is called
Windows Live Messenger, Microsoft has recently started referring to the entire service as the
Windows Live Messenger Service in its support documentation.
The service can integrate with the
Windows operating system, automatically and simultaneously signing into the network as the user logs into their Windows account. Corporations can also integrate their
Microsoft Office Communications Server and
Active Directory with the service.
Software
Official clients
Microsoft offers the following instant messaging clients that connect to the .NET Messenger Service:
- *MSN Messenger was the former name of the client from 1999 to 2005
Third-party clients
Additionally, these third-party clients and others can access the .NET Messenger Service:
- aMSN (Multi-platform, GPL)
- BitlBee (Windows and Unix-like, GPL)
- Digsby (Windows, Mac and Linux planned, proprietary)
- (Web-based msn messenger)
- Meetro (Multi-platform, proprietary)
- Pidgin (formerly Gaim) (Multi-platform, GPL)
- Shape Services IMPlus (S60)
- tmsnc (Multi-platform, text based)
- Trillian (Multi-platform, Web, proprietary)
Disambiguation
Windows NT Messenger Service
Windows NT and newer
operating systems from Microsoft included a system notification service called
Messenger service, which was intended for use within workgroups, but eventually became used maliciously to present pop-up advertisements to users. This service, although it has a similar name, is not related in any way to the .NET Messenger Service or the
Windows Messenger instant messaging client. It became disabled by default with
Windows XP Service Pack 2 and
Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1 and was removed completely in
Windows Vista and
Windows Server 2008.
Microsoft .NET Framework
Despite its name, the .NET Messenger Service is not in any way related to the
Microsoft .NET Framework development platform. Neither the official clients nor the protocol itself is tied to the .NET Framework. The official clients themselves have verified this information. The name was invented as part of the that did not go as expected.
Criticism
The .NET Messenger Service has been criticized for the use of the Microsoft Notification Protocol, which in comparison to many other modern instant messaging protocols, such as
XMPP, does not provide any
encryption. This makes wiretapping personal conversations in .NET Messenger a trivial task, especially in unencrypted public
Wi-Fi networks.
See also
