News 

As well as support for plug-ins - to better customise the application - Yahoo! has opened up the program interfaces (APIs) to encourage third-parties to pick up the Messenger ball and run with it.

Those leading the way include Amazon and eBay. A plug-in from the former allows you to make recommendations to other Yahoo! Messenger users and view friends' wish lists. The eBay plug-in lets you track eBay listings and view items recently won.

For its part, Yahoo! is highlighting its 360 Plug-In, for viewing friends' blogs, photos and other items of Yahoo! hosted content. Its Music Plug-In tunes you in to pre-programmed radio stations directly from Yahoo! Messenger.

Other features of the beta include a larger Friends List (up to 1,000 contacts), sound effects via a Soundboard feature, and an increased file transfer limit (upped by a factor of ten, to 1GB).

The Yahoo! plug-in application gallery can be found here, and the Windows download here.