Microsoft and Yahoo flunk on IM interoperability

Microsoft and Yahoo! have failed to meet an interoperability deadline for their instant messaging services.

The two last year promised to allow users of their Yahoo IM and MSN Messenger to contact each by the second quarter of 2006, but haven't linked their services.

A spokesperson for Yahoo told vnunet.com that the internet portal plans to make an announcement "soon", but declined any further comment.

Microsoft in a statement to vnunet.com wrote that: "Yahoo! and MSN are looking forward to bringing interoperability to its combined global Instant Messaging community very soon. We have not announced a specific date yet and have no other details to share at this time."

Yahoo and Microsoft both trail behind market lead AOL in the instant messenger market.

None of the leading IM platforms currently offers interoperability, forcing users to maintain accounts for multiple services if they want to stay in touch with all their contacts.

The lack of interoperability has given rise to so-called unified messengers, such as Trillian for the PC and Fire for the Mac. Such applications manage multiple user accounts, preventing the user from having to run a separate application for each messaging network.

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