> Microsoft Office Evolves Community as Part of Office 2010 Launch:
> As you know, this is a big year for Microsoft as we are launching the
> latest version of Office.   Office 2010 is all about making it easy for
> you to get and use Office on your terms.  Office 2010 lets you work from
> the office, from home, or at school across the PC, the Phone, and the
> Browser.     You can purchase Office 2010 from retail, from our OEM
> manufactures when you purchase a new PC, or get it direct from Microsoft,
> faster than ever via a new software delivery mechanism called
> Click-To-Run.

> And, we're working hard to provide you the customer support you want, when
> you want it.   We are offering 1-year of technical support included in our
> Office Professional 2010 SKU.  We are expanding and improving our
> community to provide free, 24/7 support.  The details of this evolution
> are outlined below, but suffice it to say, we're really excited about this
> as it aligns with our Office 2010 vision of Office on your terms

> What is Happening?
> This message is to inform you that Microsoft will soon begin discontinuing
> newsgroups and transitioning users to Microsoft forums.

> Why?
> As you may know, newsgroups have existed for many years now; however, the
> traffic in the Microsoft newsgroups has been steadily decreasing for the
> past several years while customers and participants are increasingly
> finding
> solutions in the forums on Microsoft properties and third party sites.
> This
> move will unify the customer experience, centralize content, make it
> easier
> for active contributors to retain their influence, mitigate redundancies
> and
> make the content easier to find by customers and search engines through
> improved indexing.  Additionally, forums offer a better user and spam
> management platform that will improve customer satisfaction by encouraging
> a
> healthy discussion in a clean community space.  To this end, Microsoft
> will
> begin to progressively shift available resources to the forums technology
> and discontinue support for newsgroups.

> In addition to offering a compelling online browser experience, for those
> users who prefer to use an NNTP (newsgroup) reader to participate in the
> newsgroups community, we have developed a solution called the NNTP Bridge
> which allows a user to connect a variety of supported NNTP readers to the
> forums they would like to participate in and continue having the NTTP
> reader
> functionality.  You can find instructions on how to download and set up
> the
> NNTP Bridge here: http://connect.microsoft.com/MicrosoftForums/

> When will this Happen?
> Effective June 1, 2010 this newsgroup will be closed.

> Where Should I go with the Closure of this Newsgroup?
> Microsoft has a large selection of forums, many of which cover either the
> same or closely related technologies to the ones found in the newsgroups.
> The forums have seen amazing growth and are an excellent place to continue
> the discussion.  We recommend that you start with:
> http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/accessdev/threads

> Should you want to visit the other Microsoft Forums, please go to
> http://www.microsoft.com/communities/forums/default.mspx

> Who Should I Contact with any Questions?
> Send any questions about the process, recommended forums and timing to
> N...@microsoft.com