TechCrunch says that;

Facebook succeeds because it is the killer web application for communications and personal information management. Facebook Mail is not without its problems, but the combination of Facebook Mail, Facebook Chat, and what is functionally an auto updating address book, makes Facebook into the new Outlook not only for those who are inside of Silicon Valley, but for anyone of the millions of people who use Facebook as either their sole or their primary digital identity

Now don’t get me wrong – I’m an evangelist for web-based solutions and I’m also a fan boy (does that term work for anything other than Apple) of disruption in general – but lets look dispassionately at this one. The statistics are pretty telling, Outlook has massive market share in the business world (read – where the dollars are MS is) and rather than being disrupted outright, my view is that Microsoft will iterate their products to meet the market. We’ve already seen some things along these lines (check out Xobni if you haven’t already – great search and social aspects for Outlook) – at one stage Microsoft was rumoured to be in the process of purchasing Xobni, this never eventuated but clearly it is an area where Outlook may move.

As TechCrunch says;

what is the take away from all of this? For Microsoft to pick up the proverbial ball and start running with it, it will need to listen to what the consumer wants, and design products that fit those needs, rather than assuming that the consumer will buy whatever it is that Microsoft hands them, just because it is a Microsoft product. And, the young consumers of today, the big spenders of tomorrow, want products that are focused on mobility, ease of use, speed, and simplicity

I agree entirely – but caution people not to write of Microsoft just yet

Alex uses the fact that email is poor at broadcast, discussion and business to come to the conclusion that, while email isn’t going to disappear anytime soon, new tools are a threat to how much we do via email. He suggests a splitting of the ways – with consumers moving to new forms of communication and enterprise remaining wedded to email. It’s most informative to read the comments under the post – the consensus seems to be that email is here for the long haul.

Conceptually I’m all with Alex on this one, but in practice the reality is closer to what Zoli points out in his post. Twitter, IM and SMS are mainly used in a social context. The fact is that most employees will use these tools where appropriate, but will revert to email where an audit trail or a historical sequence is required.

More to the point we’re seeing tools such as Xobni that aim to make it easier to utilise the power of the network, directly via email. This, is to a certain extent reinforcing emails position as the medium of choice.

Sure Wiki’s and IM are great for some things (Wikis for a collaborative project, IM for short sharp “mindbursts”) but email is still the primary tool and will continue to be so for the foreseeable future. Zoli posted this diagram which try’s to depict the continuum for communication – I would title it the early adopters communication continuum but regardless of that it’s an interesting concept.

Either way email is here for the long haul – sure different products (be they add-ons like Xobni or disrupters like Gmail) will come and go but it’ll take something significant to damage the momentum that email has, especially within business use.

Xobni sees itself as much more than just a simple outlook plugin – they’re working on a YahooMail product and one assumes Gmail comes next. Perhaps now WorkLight and Xobni will see the synergies between them and do some sort of merger deal??? A kind of enterprise 2.0, email/social networking uber offering?

The blogosphere is mildly warm with talk about Microsoft’s attempts to acquire…… no not Yahoo but Xobni.

Xobni (inbox spelt backwards) (Diversity coverage here) is a cool Outlook plugin that brings some social networking and efficiency functionality to the MS offering. Apparently Xobni has said;

we’re staying an independent company and will be exiting beta soon

In appreciation of Xobni’s attempts to stay independent (and how long it’ll last no-one knows), Diversity Blogs has a few invites to become a beta tester of Xobni. Just leave a comment to this post and we can hook you up quick smart.