Microsoft announced Tuesday it was retiring its online chat service Windows Live Messenger in early 2013 and would be immediately combining Windows Messenger with Skype, allowing WM users to sign into a Skype account and have all their WLM contacts accessible. Skype has 280 million monthly users compared to Windows Live Messenger’s 100 million plus, down from its peak of around 300 million users, The Next Web reported.
Microsoft purchased Skype for $8.5 billion in 2011 and recently updated the popular video and text chat client to work with its new Windows 8 operating system.
