Windows Live Taskforce

Don't limit the size of groups to 20 people based on Messenger

Submitted by mjflynt on March 14, 2009 to Aesthetics, Annoyance, Icons, Usability

Problem: Instead of listing every member of a group in Messenger and limiting the group size to 20 or less (if it is going to use Messenger to allow group chat) why not list only those actually online and not limit the overall group size to a absolute maximum of 20. This saves space in your Messenger window and allows larger groups to use Messenger. A group with 150 people in it might be lucky to have five or ten actually logged into Messenger at a given time. I don't need to see the offline group members. I"m in a couple groups that have about ten people. The most that I've seen online, however, it two. This feature is never going to get used as designed because in these small groups people are likely to just add each other as contacts to Messenger rather than chat through the group (like family members would do). To be truly useful it needs to work for larger groups. It can still be limited to 20 people chatting, but just pick the first 20 ONLINE. Don't just disable group chats because they have more than twenty people in the group.

Solution: List only the first 20 members of a group that are actually online, and allow them to group chat. Do not show the 21st and later online person or show them with a special icon indicating they are not available, and do not let them in the chat. Show them a message saying something like the group XYZ chat is full - please try again later.

This would allow a group of any size to use group chat and still limit it to the first 20 people only. I see no real advantage of having all the members always listed. It's just clutter and any operation you might want to do with that membership list you could do at the group website membership list

Severity: Medium

Impact: High

Status: Not fixed