So Microsoft released a beta of a new blog authoring application called Windows Live Writer last friday. I’ve got to think this will be an included tool in Vista, and even though we tend to harp on Microsoft a lot around here, I think this is a good sign that Redmond is starting to wise up to the kinds of functionality their modern users can really benefit from.

Launching along with the application itself, we’ve been presented with a developer blog called “Writer Zone“, much along the lines of the IE 7 developer site. Launching blogs along with new products is a very mature move on Microsoft’s part, and it feels to me like these will really improve the quality of the products they release if the MS bigwigs actually listen to what the user base has to say.