Plenty of companies advertise how their product can help the world in some way. Firms sometimes brag about using recyclable materials or the charities they donate to. Even if I think the company is doing it for publicity reasons, the donations still help a good cause, so I approve. Well, now Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) has designed a creative way of drawing in customers and sending out donations.

The program, called i'm (think instant messaging), donates a portion of the ad revenue that Microsoft receives each time you use Windows Live Messenger or Windows Live Hotmail. So just by using its services the user can give to a worthy cause. Since March of last year, this service has raised over $1.5 million in ad revenue for charity.

Starting June 23, the initiative is hosting the i'mtalkathon (read the disclaimer at the bottom). It's "30 days of e-mailing and IMing for the common cause." The intention is to get people who stumble upon the 'blog' to go and sign up for one of the offered services. Surely, this will help raise money for charities as well as Microsoft.

AT&T Inc. (NYSE: T) recently up 39c to $37.90:

AT&T will be participating in the 700 MHz spectrum auction that begins in December. AT&T's CEO & Chairman Randall Stephenson said last night "700 MHz is the last available spectrum out there." The company has been frequently chatted about as interested in acquiring DISH. T December option implied volatility of 32 was above its 26-week average of 27 according to Track Data, suggesting larger risk.

Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE: VZ) recently up 09c to $42.50:

VZ is expected to be participating in the 700 MHz spectrum auction that begins in December. VZ over all option implied volatility of 29 was above its 26-week average of 25 according to Track Data, suggesting slightly larger risk.

Daily Options Update is provided by Stock Specialist Paul Foster of theflyonthewall.com

A piece in today's Wall Street Journal takes a look at the growing popularity of instant messaging as a means of communication at work. As the Journal puts it, "Instant messaging is invading and changing the workplace. Employees started to sneak instant messaging into the office in the late 1990s, but now more companies are endorsing it. Faster and more casual than email, instant messaging can foster broader collaboration among employees even as it further blurs the boundaries between work and life."

Those of us who work for BloggingStocks are in constant communication via AOL Instant Messenger (Full Disclosure: BloggingStocks is owned by AOL): We discuss story ideas, the markets, and chat. Instant messaging has built a sense of camaraderie and closeness among people working thousands of miles apart that frankly never would have developed through more traditional lines of communication.

Several experts quoted in the piece predict that instant messaging at work will grow rapidly in popularity: Currently about 1/3 of workers IM at work, often without the knowledge of their bosses, but one expert believes that it will become the dominant method of communication in the workplace.

As well it should.

Breaking up is hard to do. But these days it's a little easier, thanks to a new concept -- the e-breakup -- the use of email or instant messaging to break off relationships.

As described in the Boston Globe, it looks to me like the e-breakup makes things much easier for the message sender -- the e-breakuper -- and not that much harder for the receiver --- the e-breakupee.

The e-breakuper is much better off -- saving the time spent delivering the message and facing the e-breakupee's suffering. Meanwhile the e-breakupee is a little worse off -- missing out on a last chance to see and lay a guilt trip on the e-breakuper.

There's no putting the e-breakup genie back in the bottle. And there's no doubt it's changing how relationships work.

Have you been an e-breakuper or e-breakupee? Is it better or worse?

As I mentioned in my post about Blogher, AIM is where it's at for the sorts of people who use instant messenger programs to communicate. Not only do teenagers love the product, with all the spiraling viral effects that has for AOL, but I use it for work -- and many other businesses are becoming IM-savvy.

AIM, however, may have come to a bit of an innovation plateau -- the unit seems to be focusing on cuteness and personality rather than functionality. AOL needed to get working if the company wished to expand into the nether reaches of instant communication and electronic networking. Today's announcement of the company's acquisition of Userplane (for an undisclosed sum) underscored Time Warner's dual strategies in this market, which are (1) dominate and innovate and (2) do it by acquisition, whenever possible.

Userplane CEO Mike Jones says the company will remain a separate unit, and the company's venture capitalist lauds Userplane for having been cashflow positive "for a long time." Userplane brings a very strong position in the dating and social networking market, and it's oh-so-Web 2.0. According to TechCrunch, Userplane "uses Flash and Ajax to offer video, audio and text chat in the browser, in single or multiple chat rooms. Those video and audio chats can be recorded using the company's Webrecorder application."

The most familiar AOL brand for many, many users is its AOL Instant Messenger. AIM counts some 43 million users. Were Time Warner to falter against Yahoo!, Google, and other companies looking to squeeze into the IM market, the competitors would waste no time in snatching millions of users away. It will be a bit of a relief for AOL/Time Warner followers to hear that AOL is paying close attention to AIM and courting developers. AIM is opening chat to programmers even more, letting them in to tinker and innovate so that AOL can keep this lead against fast up and comers like eBay's Skype.

Whether or not letting more people use the protocol allows AOL to continue dominance is unknown. It's still a bit of a risky gamble if developers just use the protocol to make their own IM applications. But the more people able to use AIM the more AOL can hold the marketshare in people's minds, and that'll be cheaper to do than by mailing CDs to every house in the country for brand recognition.

AOL will continue planting seeds beyond its formerly walled garden by offering a free voice-over-Internet phone service called AIM Phoneline. The service will be an extension of its popular instant messaging service and will provide users with a local phone number and the ability to receive incoming phone calls from anywhere. AOL will also offer an enhanced subscription version for $14.95/month which will allow subscribers to make local and long distance calls from their computers.

AIM (along with the other major portals) already sports talk features but Phoneline will be a more robust version which will compete with eBay's Skype as well as traditional telephone services. In addition, AIM Phoneline will be a part of a broader strategy to leverage AOL instant messaging that will include a social networking channel as well (stay tuned for more details on that one as they arise).

Skype, long the darling of VOIP newbies like me, is nothing if not a bandwagon-jumper. The company, acquired by eBay last September, has never stayed true to its phone calling roots, dabbling in everything from instant messaging to voicemail to videocasting. And we know it: everybody's doing ring tones.

The latest bandwagon, straight from the playbooks of the rest of the phone calling world: music downloads. Today Skype signed agreements with a number of the music biggies, including Warner / Chappell Music, EMI Music Publishing, and Sony / ATV Music Publishing. These agreements will allow Skype to distribute many of its ringtones "lawfully" (was it unlawful before, I wonder?) from artists like Madonna, Depeche Mode, and the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

So I've got to know: how long before Skype launches a campaign where they play some hip-shaking song from the most commercially over-exposed group on television, the Black-eyed Peas? I predict it won't be long.