Since Facebook just launched a possible Twitter rival that integrates right into its social network, it suddenly dawned upon me that Microsoft could do something very similar that would immediately create a user base many times larger than Twitter's without the users themselves realising the change.

Let me explain, since Microsoft Messenger 6 (I think) users have been able to add a personal message next to their display name. This long-time and well-loved feature, is strikingly similar to Twitter save the ability to have a thread of past messages and a mix of yours and your friend's.

I've seem the personal message used to denote current location, wishing everyone on a festival day, self publicity (alright I admit I do this too), and even... ahem... to do a Steve Rubel.

I guess the difference is that the personal message is currently a real-time platform as opposed to a time-stamped one like Twitter. But I see little difference since what you're doing now will inevitable be what you've done just before. In fact, it'll be nice to see a trail of "what I'm listing to" at different times of the day.

I don't claim to be a fantastic programmer, but I truly believe that all Microsoft has to do is build in those rather simple Twitter features into Microsoft Messenger and immediately you'll have a "twittering" crowd of over 400 million without changing anything about the way its users behave.