Why just link to a fellow blogger... when you can link AND show their messenger presence?

I just linked to my buddy Johann Kruse on my previous post;

instead of just using his name and linking to his blog;

I decided to show is Messenger presence there and add a link to the IM control.

Johann has published his messenger presence and using the same ID he uses in the iframe I can get his presence image.

The code to do this is below:

<a href="http://blogs.technet.com/jkruse/" target="_blank">Johann Kruse</a>
&nbsp;
<a href="http://settings.messenger.live.com/Conversation/IMMe.aspx?invitee=2b16bf02204879e5%40apps.messenger.live.com&amp;mkt=en-US" target="_blank">
    <img alt="Click to IM Johann" src="http://messenger.services.live.com/users/2b16bf02204879e5@apps.messenger.live.com/presenceimage" border="0">
</a>