Windows Live Messenger - the successor to MSN Messenger - is out, and it's very shiny... Shiny like Windows Vista. I think it does some new stuff that works (or will work) with other (upcoming) Microsoft software applications and online services, but really, I just use it to keep in touch with friends and make arrangements to do thing things in RealLife© The shiny is a nice upgrade, I guess.
I've also been playing with Internet Explorer 7 Beta 2 and Opera 9, and comparing them to Firefox 1.5.x.x. Both IE7 and Opera 9 look very slick, offer all of the same basic functionality we've come to expect from Mozilla's products, and seem to offer comparable browsing experiences to the general user. They have some interface nuances that aren't exactly what most users are used to, but they're intuitive enough that they can be picked-up pretty easily. Aside from the font-smoothing of IE7, all three browsers looked pretty much the same, and performance differences between the three were negligible as far as I could tell (although I like how IE7 and Opera 9 free-up memory when you minimize them; Firefox hasn't done that by default for a few versions now). Aside from what seemed to be a Flash issue on YouTube with IE7, I didn't run into any glaring problems... I think that means that things bode well for Internet Explorer. Like Messenger, these products all do much more advanced and wonderful things like run "widgets" and "extensions" and the like... But really, I use them for browsing webpages, so I'm gonna leave it at that.
I also got to play with the latest Windows Vista Beta on a laptop that had a performance rating of 1 (out of 5), and it still looked very pretty. The menus (and Control Panel, etc...) seemed convoluted, but then again I only spent like five minutes with it while two people looked over my shoulder. I might put it on one of my systems some day soon if I can find a hard drive to spare, but I'm in no rush.
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