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SEATTLE, Washington (AP) -- Microsoft Corp. is becoming the latest company aiming to bring blogging to the masses with a free new tool that lets people easily set up Web journals.

MSN Spaces, which debuts in test form Thursday, is targeted at home users who want to share things like vacation pictures, text journals or a list of favorite songs. The service, free to anyone with a Hotmail e-mail or MSN Messenger account, is part of Microsoft's effort to keep people in a Microsoft-branded universe for all their online communication needs.

MSN Spaces will be supported by banner ads that appear at the top of the Web logs.

Plenty of other companies already offer tools to make it easy for less tech-savvy users to create and maintain blogs, the popular Web logs that track everything from workday antics to political gossip.

Microsoft rival AOL has provided its members with a tool since mid-2003, and search engine leader Google Inc. -- another key Microsoft competitor -- offers a free service through its Blogger.com site. Movable Type offers the popular TypePad service, starting at $4.95 a month

Microsoft previously offered a service, called MSN Groups, which let people create their own Web sites. But this is the first time it is turning its attention to the growing blogging phenomenon.

Michael Gartenberg, research director with Jupiter Research, said he thinks Microsoft has learned from where it initially missed the boat on some technologies, such as Web search, that it's important to offer consumers these products early, or risk losing them to rival services.

Although Microsoft is trailing Google and AOL, Gartenberg said it's not too late since blogging is only just catching on with mainstream users.

Microsoft is closely integrating MSN Spaces with its Messenger and Hotmail programs, with the idea that people will hop from one Microsoft product to another for online communications.

For example, users can set up a system that alerts friends on MSN Messenger when they have updated their Web journals. If a blogger chooses to limit access to his or her Web journal to a select group of guests, those people will need to use Microsoft's "Passport" to log in. The most common way to get a Passport login is to sign up for a Hotmail or Messenger account.

Users can update their MSN Spaces from the Web or remotely via e-mail or cell phone. AOL lets you update via its instant messenger.

Microsoft also is more closely integrating some of its other products with its online communication tools, stepping up its competition with companies ranging from Apple Computer Inc. to Google.

The MSN Spaces tool that lets a user create a favorite music list will automatically link to Microsoft's MSN Music site, where Microsoft is hoping to build a business selling songs online. Blake Irving, a Microsoft corporate vice president in charge of MSN's communications efforts, said the company has no plans to give users the option of linking their music lists to another service, such as Apple's iTunes.

An update to MSN Messenger, also debuting in test from Thursday, will add Microsoft's MSN search bar to the messenger screen. Users also will be able to highlight and click on a group of words in an instant message to search the Web.

Microsoft is testing its own search engine to better compete with Google. Its MSN search currently uses Yahoo Inc. technology.

Other MSN Messenger updates will make it easier to send instant messages over the Web, even if the computer the person is using doesn't have Messenger installed, and add more sophisticated graphic messages called "winks."

The final version of MSN Spaces is expected by next June. For now, Irving said the company plans to keep MSN Spaces as a free service, but he wouldn't rule out the idea of creating a paid, premium blog service down the road.

credits CNN