14 DAY TRIAL // Microsoft has expanded the customization options of the Live.com experience. With the introduction of the Live.com Collections, the Redmond Company aims to deliver an improved social dimension to its users.
"Collections are Live.com pages of gadgets and feeds created and shared by users. Add your favorite Collections to your own Live.com page, or share one of your Live.com pages with the community," informed Microsoft.
The Redmond Company has introduced Live.com Collections concomitantly with the Overview section of Windows Live Gallery and with a host of new Windows Vista Sidebar gadgets, at the beginning of February 2007.
Via the Live Collections users will be able not only to personalize their pages but also to share them along with any content they might have posted. As of yet, the only downside to this initiative is the limited number of collections available for customization. The Windows Live Gallery team did not provide extra details on the collections, outside of the fact that they are meant to deliver a twist to the Live.com pages.
As of yet, all the collections available have been centralized on a single page and they cover mainly celebrities, entertainment, news and sport pages. Microsoft needs to diversify this initial offer if it wants its initiative to pick up.
In addition to the collections, the Windows Live Gallery team has also informed that it has improved browsing functionality. According to the Windows Liver Gallery team, browsing will now respect the language settings of the user. Moreover, tags have also been cleaned up of any irrelevant results.