A Microsoft Account Connects Your Microsoft World
By Richard Hay for Windows Observer
The Microsoft Account that we use these days has actually been around for a while and has been known under several different names:
•Microsoft Wallet
•Microsoft Passport
•.NET Passport
•Microsoft Passport Network
•Windows Live ID
Each one brought together ideas that have now become what we know as a Microsoft Account and that account is, pun intended, a passport to everything Microsoft related.
With just a single Microsoft Account you will now bring all of these services under one log-in:
•Hotmail (shifting to Outlook.com)
•Messenger (shifting over to Skype)
•SkyDrive (7GB of cloud storage)
•Windows Phone
•Xbox LIVE
•Outlook.com
On top of those services your Microsoft Account also gives you a centralized location to view billing data for all of the premium services you subscribe to and purchases you make under the Microsoft umbrella.
With the introduction of Windows 8 last year the Microsoft account takes on an entirely new and unique role if you have made that move to Windows 8.
This excerpt appears with permission from Windows Observer.
