MSN addon?

[Xrystal]

Originally Posted by Petrah I don't. As soon as I install Windows, the very first thing I do is disable MSN Messenger. Couldn't pay me enough to use that piece of crap lol. I don't really have any use for Skype either. Either way, what you are suggesting is never going to happen.

Ditto. In fact I only ever use Yahoo and there are only 2 people on my friends list and they play the same games as me so I use the in game chat system and yahoo if we're not all in game and then we have vent to actually talk to each other. Thats my personal choice however.

Maybe there are people out there that have lots of friends that chat with them on these chat systems and they don't play these games then they will see the benefit.

Now the suggestion offered for using xfire sounds like the best option for you and others and seeing as it interfaces with msn it sounds perfect for you and hopefully you will find it just what you want.

[Zyonin]

Originally Posted by Tonfish About the icq/aol problem: I don't think that blizzard would implement all of them if they wanted that. But if they only implement msn, then a lot of players would switch from the alternatives to msn and that means a huge business to msn. BUT if blizzard implements them, then maybe the user will have to choose wich program he wants to use, before he logs in. But I think that's only a minor issue and it can be solved in a hundred ways or more.

WARNING: Incoming Wall of text!

I seriously doubt that people would switch to MSN just be able to chat in WoW. If that was the case, Xfire would be MUCH bigger than it is now, same with Playxpert and other similar applications. There are many people who simply do not like Microsoft and will not EVER sign up for a Live account.

In addition, extra business for Microsoft? Microsoft does do business with Blizzard however it's in the form of Massive which supplies the banner adverts on Blizzard's sites. However on the MSN side, there would not be extra business for Microsoft even if many people "switched" to MSN Messenger. Why? Microsoft does not make money from MSN Messenger itself, it's free to use for chatting and such. Where Microsoft does make money is in the advertising within the Messenger client.

By trying support 11+ million WoW players using the MSN protocol in the WoW client and using the MSN Messenger framework, Microsoft gets a bunch of users, additional strain on the network, however ZERO eyeballs for the adverts. Microsoft has nothing to gain from such an arrangement and actually, it's a strong disincentive. Sure MSN users can avoid the adverts by using alternate IM clients (such as Pidgin, Trillian, Miranda IM, Kopete or Empathy for us Gnome users) or using 3d party plug-ins to nuke the adverts in the MSN Client (which breaks the MSN EULA/TOS) however those users who avoid adverts are a mere fraction of MSN users.

Somehow Microsoft would want someone to pay for MSN support within WoW. Blizzard would not do this as it will compete with Battle.net. So how about MS displaying adverts in-game in a hypothetical MSN WoW framework? Uh huh, Blizzard would get such a QQ storm that the forums would crash. Besides it would break the immersion and polish that Blizzard strives for in addition to competing directly with Battle.net.

Trust me. The arguments for MSN/Skype/other IM support from within WoW have already been discussed and shot down many times over. The answer is always NO. If a player is set on chatting on MSN in game, there are several usable routes:

• Run in Windowed Mode so you can see MSN pop-ups
• Run Dual Monitors (with MSN on the second monitor)
• Use an application that uses a DirectX overlay. The best known is Xfire (which now has MSN support), another poster mentioned PlayXpert.

[shkm]

I wouldn't be surprised to see a Battle.net IM program in the future. Blizzard are making the service able to send PMs throughout all Blizzard games, so why not outside of those games too? And if we're lucky, it would get LibPurple support too.

As already suggested, though, give XFire or PlayXPert a try if you really want to talk to people from within wow.