By Mark Prigg
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Microsoft is dropping its instant-messaging program and forcing most of its 100m users to switch to Skype.
Experts had speculated that Windows Live Messenger made less sense after Microsoft bought Skype for $8.5 billion last year.
'Skype and Messenger are coming together,' Skype said in a post at its website.
The latest version of Microsoft's Windows Live Messenger, which is being retired and its 100m users moved to Skype
'By updating to Skype, Messenger users can instant message and video call their Messenger friends.'
A new version of Skype released a few weeks ago allows users to sign in with a Microsoft account.
By merging the two services, people won't have to maintain two separate contact lists.
Microsoft says much has changed in how people communicate.
There's more use of text messaging and social networking.
Microsoft says that Messenger users who switch to Skype will get benefits such as the ability to call landline and mobile phones and better support on mobile devices.
Skype will now replace the service for Microsoft
Skype is also available on mobile phones
Except for mainland China, Messenger will be discontinued worldwide after the first quarter of 2013.
Early this year Microsoft's Skype division chief Tony Bates cited Facebook as key to the growth of the service, which hoped to quadruple its number of users to a billion.
A Skype feature on Facebook allows for multiperson conversations and a camera icon that can be clicked on for instant one-on-one video calls with friends.
Skype users can make low-cost or free phone calls over the Internet using their computers or smartphones. Skype bypasses the standard telephone network by channeling voice and video calls over the Web.
Microsoft last year bought Skype for $8.5 billion in a move seen as aimed at boosting its presence in an online arena dominated by Google and Facebook.
Skype was founded in 2003 and acquired by online auction giant eBay in September 2005.
It was sold to an investment group led by Silver Lake in November 2009 in a deal that valued the company at $2.75 billion.
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