Microsoft collaborates over social networks

Microsoft has announced collaborations with five social networks to increase the interoperability of its software.

The vendor said plans to collaborate with the popular sites Facebook, Bebo, Hi5, LinkedIn and Tagged would help to make it easier and safer for social networking tool users to move their relationships around the web.

The collaboration includes an exchange of application programming interfaces (APIs) that will allow users to move their contacts and relationships between services more safely and securely.

Earlier this month, Microsoft unveiled the beta release of the Windows Live Contacts API, to allow web developers to use in production to enable their customers to transfer and share their Windows Live Contacts.

John Richards, Director of Windows Live Platform wrote in a blog on the 'Windows Live Dev' website dedicated to the development partnerships that the use of APIs would avoid the use of 'screen scraping' mechanisms.

"We have provided an alternative that is equally open but unequivocally safer and more secure for customers," he said.

Microsoft also launched a new website, Windows Invite2Messenger, to showcase its vision, where users can invite their contacts from any of the five social network partners to join them on Windows Live Messenger.

But the service is only live today on Facebook, allowing Windows Live Messenger users, to invite social networked friends to chat using the instant messaging (IM) software. Microsoft said Bebo, Hi5, LinkedIn and Tagged would become live on the invite2messenger site in the coming months.

Suw Charman-Anderson, social networking technology consultant welcomed the Windows Live Contacts API beta release. "There is a habit among sites that, if they want you to import contact data from another service, they ask for your username and password to 'screen scrape' the data. But there's no guarantees that the website will look after your password and it also encourages users to get into bad habits, which could leave them more open to phishing attacks."

But she added that today's announcement from Microsoft had left her "seriously" underwhelmed,' in comparison to Google's commitment to developing open APIs through its OpenSocial Foundation launched yesterday.

"I see the OpenSoical announcement as Google trying to take themselves out of the picture, where Microsoft are just trying to insert themselves into a similar picture, while driving more users to it Live Messenger service," she told IT PRO.

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