News Via Instant Messenger

"The Netherlands is somewhat of a test market for services around Instant Messenger, Microsoft's chat client.

With 4 million active IM users in a country of 15 million, IM is incredibly popular, and becoming a mass medium in its own right. Microsoft is now starting to give out licenses for commercial "chatbots" that users can add to their buddy list.

Dutch banks already have started to use the service: Postbank and SNSBank ran trials in which IM users could get account information within the IM chat -- just by typing in questions like "How much money do I have?"

The system would recognize most natural-language questions around such a defined topic. The city of Utrecht ran a campaign in which IM users could ask natural-language questions about local events."