Microsoft’s grand plan to eliminate phone numbers | All about Microsoft | ZDNet.com
This is from one transcript of an early May speech Gates gave in Japan: “Right now the mobile phone, the desktop phone, the e-mail that you have on the PC, or instant messaging, these are all very different things, and the issues about how much of your information or your schedule, your current activity you share with people who communicate with you is not well designed…. By bringing together all of these kinds of communication, we can greatly simplify them. We can get rid of phone numbers, have it so when you say you want to contact someone, based on who you are and where that person is, they can decide whether to take the call or take a message about that, and so a great efficiency improvement that can be made there.” (emphasis mine) So how does Microsoft propose getting rid of phone numbers? Here’s an overview, from the same source who originally tipped me on Echoes: Starting with Echoes Wave 1 — the first iteration of Microsoft’s services platform for telco providers that is due out this summer — Microsoft plans to synchronize contacts. In other words, Live Messenger contacts will appear in a mobile user’s address book (if the carrier is using Echoes). The contacts will be synced via Windows Live Messenger, so duplicates are eliminated.
