You got the photos. You got the music. You got the blogging. You got the instant messaging. MSN Spaces is pretty cool stuff. Even though, I'm less excited because I'm Mac-based and things don't work so swell on MSN Spaces for Mac users. Like the music part. It doesn't work in Safari on my PowerBook.
I think blogging is the coolest thing in social networking. In the spirit of Generation C, I love the blogging along with the photos and what not. It's not just personal. I surfed a few pages. I like that you've got tabs for blog, music, photos etc. It feels a little like Live Journal.
Of course, Microsoft is totally leveraging their own products like: Hotmail, IE, MSN Messenger, Passport and Windows Media Player. Some things never change. This proprietary stuff in the name of convenience will sell as usual.
But, lots of people who don't want to play that game will opt out. It doesn't hurt to check it out, though. And, as far as I can tell, it is free at this point. Have at it. You could play the game of getting your favorite member name for a start.
I like that this is a bunch of *new* money and energy going into the blogging space. It's probably one reason that Six Apart recently took $10 mil in funding. They wanted to be able to play with Google and Microsoft. Ups the ante. All that effort and, hopefully, intense competition should be good for blogging and social networking etc. I was thinking, Yahoo might not be far behind...
You know me. I had to try it. Got my space: Tech Ronin (surprise!). Got my user name Tech_Ronin. Put in a few bits of information in my profile. While there, I was shocked at the gigantic ads in columns on the left and right of my profile. At the moment they are selling MSN personals, halter dresses (isn't it a little cold for that?) and balance transfers. That does NOT work for me. They obviously haven't read the Cluetrain Manifesto or anything. Geez!
I loaded up a photo. I made a list which was pretty easy - the list was Favorite Macintosh software. That seems appropriate.
I've got a *dead* Live Journal and Blogger sites too, so I really don't expect much here. It's hard to get too excited on this one. Even if it's not our cup of tea, Microsoft's scale and resources gives them the chance to make a big splash in our pond. It could be interesting...
I'm always a sucker for new. Part of the fun will be tracking how bloggers react. I'll be doing my tracking with NetNewsWire 2. I'm loving the search within your feeds and the special subscriptions tools. The first lets me take a quick read on what everyone is saying about a topic at this moment and the other gives me a way to track the conversation over time.