MSN calls time on chatrooms

Microsoft has officially shut down its MSN chatrooms in 24 countries – to cheers from child protection groups, sneers from rivals and an ambivalent reaction from its users.

Microsoft touted the closures – which will affect British chatrooms, but not those in the US and Japan were MSN has concrete billing details about its users – as a move to help stop such unmoderated forums being used as a vehicle for paedophiles to 'groom' children.

While they may have a point that a tiny percentage of users are abusing the system – a prolific internet paedophile who met his victims on MSN chatroom, Douglas Lindsell, was jailed just last week - rival ISPs believe the move is purely cost-motivated, allowing MSN to rake in extra money by migrating users to subscription services.

Earlier this year, despite acknowledging the large running cost of the service, Alex Kovach, Lycos' MD, "By switching [chatrooms] off, Microsoft looks like it is taking the moral high ground, but in reality this is irresponsible. Now it's more important that people provide responsible chat. Otherwise it will get driven underground, and the risks will increase."

MSN has also been promoting its IM service following the announcement of the shutdown.

Users of the chatrooms, however, remain unfazed by the closure. One MSN chatroom user contacted by silicon.com said that as long as rivals such as Yahoo! let their chatrooms remain in business, users would simply switch providers, adding that chatrooms wouldn't go away because Microsoft said so.