MSN Messenger (or Windows Live Messenger or Microsoft Messenger or whatever the hell it wants to call itself) is being sucky to me right now. When I tried to login earlier tonight, I got a system error message from Messenger that some upgrade to the network required that I change my Windows Live ID before being able to log in again. I thought it was just a weird error, so I just closed out Messenger and waited a few minutes. Tried logging in again and got the same message. Tried a different account, same thing.
So, I clicked through to the Windows Live help pages and found out how to change my Windows Live ID. It wasn’t completely clear why I would ever have to change it. It just gave me directions to do it and assured me that all of my account information would remain intact. I tried it on one of my alternate accounts to see if anything would go wrong. The ID change was simple. All of my contacts were still on my list, and my account settings were the same. However, all of my contacts were now offline, which almost never happens. There’s always at least one or two people online.
I decided to give it an hour to let the network update and went to get some dinner. When I came back, everyone was still offline. I IM’d one of my friends on another IM system to see if they could see my MSN account online, and it turned out I was gone as well, even though I was actually signed on (managed to add one of my other accounts to the list). I searched through MS’s help pages some more, and it looks like it can take up to 48 hours for the ID change to propagate through the network and into my contacts’ lists. How annoying.
I tried switching back to my original Windows Live ID to see if I could get my contact list to behave again, but the system sent me the same error message again. I finally gave up and changed the ID on my normal Messenger account. Two of my contacts finally showed up, so maybe they have to re-login to see my changes. I guess I’ll just have to wait it out and hope everything transitions smoothly.
One thing I find very interesting is that my two main Messenger accounts are both using .Mac email addresses. No one else I know ran into this issue ever, and they’re all using Hotmail or Gmail accounts. I wonder if that has anything to do with the sudden change… [/me enters conspiracy theory mode]…
Same here, had to change my ID address, so i changed it to a non-mac address, then immediately back to my .mac address. No go. Changed it to a non-.mac address again. I can now log in to Messenger (for Mac), but nobody is online…