[dan_m2k]

No idea, but I bet the brand equity created for the MSN brand via MSN messenger was indeed huge across a boatload of international markets.

Seems like a huge amount of wasted traction and momentum for the generation that grew up on MSN messenger, and now might be making purchase decisions where that traction could've been leveraged. It's what any other (non tech) brands do very successfully.

I saw someone repost something from msn.com the other day, and was genuinely surprised to see it was still live.

But, the way that the brand was migrated

   MSN Messenger -> Windows Live Messenger -> Bing (?) -> etc etc 

was a shitshow and made death a sweet relief for it.