Web messenger tool

Microsoft is asking people to try to shoot the latest MSN Messenger. A public beta, or test version, of the upcoming instant messaging software--MSN Messenger version 6--will be available for download at the company's Web site on Wednesday, the software maker said. Up to now, MSN Messenger 6 has been available only to private beta testers. Despite its limited release, downloads reached 2 million as of last week, according to a Microsoft memo. The new software is designed to let people use multimedia features--such as Webcam shots, digital photos and smiley face icons--to personalize their chat windows. ***

Microsoft is close to launching a new version of its instant messaging service that could link its network with rivals such as Yahoo, according to sources familiar with the plans. The pending upgrade could hasten efforts to create a single IM standard and break down technology barriers that prevent users of different products from talking to each other. AOL Time Warner subsidiary America Online, the current market leader, has so far refused to open its networks to IM rivals, creating a patchwork of competing fiefdoms. Microsoft will get the interoperability ball rolling when it unveils MSN Messenger 4 in March or April, according to one source close to the company. ***

SAN FRANCISCO--Four years ago, Microsoft scrambled from behind to catch up with the "Internet gold rush" as chairman Bill Gates explained it. Today, the company spelled out plans to cash in on the next prospecting dream: e-commerce and Web development software. Microsoft executives, including president Steve Ballmer and senior vice president Paul Maritz, today unveiled new development tools and programming interfaces designed to make the company's forthcoming Windows 2000 operating system more attractive as a Web development platform, the company said. Windows is wildly popular with big companies as an operating system for PCs and smaller networked servers. But as the Web technology battleground shifts from client PCs to servers, Microsoft finds itself once again battling Sun Microsystems' Java programming language. ***