Microsoft Outlook to Add MySpace and Facebook Integration

Microsoft Outlook has just become a lot more social through new partnerships with Facebook and MySpace and an existing one with LinkedIn.

You might remember back in November that Microsoft announced Outlook Social Connector, a new Office 2010 feature that hooks up social feeds into the Outlook inbox. The initial partner for the program was LinkedIn, whose business connections, alerts and messages would integrate directly with Outlook.

Now that integration has gone live. Outlook users can now download LinkedIn for Outlook and transform their desktop inboxes into a hub for all things LinkedIn.

Overshadowing its release is Microsoft’s announcement of two big partners for the Outlook Social Connector, MySpace and Facebook. Sometime in the next few months, users will be able to check up on their MySpace friends, update their Facebook status and browse through photos.

While it’s unclear just how deep this integration will go, it’s clearly a win for Outlook and Microsoft. While Google’s Gmail service now boasts Google Buzz, Microsoft can counter that with LinkedIn, MySpace, and Facebook, all of which are more widely used than Buzz.

Do you think Outlook Social Connector will be enough to keep people hooked to Microsoft’s desktop software? Is it enough of a reason to switch? Only time will tell...