Hot on the heels of Google’s Buzz launch, Microsoft is pushing out the beta release for Outlook Social Connector, an add-on that pulls info from social-networking sites. Sound familiar? If you’ve been using Xobni then I’m sure you’ve already been using this type of functionality for quite some time.
Users of Office 2003, 2007 and beta users of Office 2010 can now download the add-on software, but don’t expect to push out updates to LinkedIn, Facebook, or MySpace (really?) until a later version. In fact, you want even see updates from Facebook or MySpace until the damn thing is finished come June when Office 2010 goes on sale. Actually, the only thing that will occur when you download the add-on from Microsoft today is the addition of a new pane in your current e-mail reading window. Users will have to download the LinkedIn plug-in in order to see updates within Outlook. What I want to know is what sort of activities transpire on LinkedIn that others would want to read?
(More on Techland: Google Buzz = Facebook + Twitter + Flickr + GChat + YouTube + Wave)
The other minute feature in OSC is the ability for multiple users – assuming they’ve been conversing over e-mail – to see edits on documents stored on Sharepoint servers any time they log on. That’s kinda like Wave.
Will Kennedy, an Office group VP, addressed business customers who think their employees will waste even more time at work with this type of functionality.
“We don’t want this to sort of be the next great time waster in the workplace,” he said.
This would actually decrease the likelihood of getting caught slacking off at work making it the greatest time waster of all time, Mr. Kennedy. Just thought you should know.
(via AP)
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