Adium

But how would that solve the problem? It's not Adium that has the problem with my contacts showing; it's Hotmail.

I know Adium has it as a preference, but can I make it happen manually? ...

Download all the contacts from hotmail or where ever you had them, then add them to your new account in Adium.

Hmm, are you saying that if I use Adium for MSN messaging this problem will go away? ...

Use Adium, not getting those errors and I have read about someone else getting it too, I think the MSN Messenger message might be a bot making people sign into a dodgy site and they could be gathering people usernames and passwords

Since you like it so much, can you answer my question (see above) and tell me how to get the damn names back in the contact list??? :D

and you adium problems shouldn't be connected i don't think. Live Hotmail is just an upgrade to the interface for your email. your account is seperate. ...

Exact same problem here. Only I try to change it to gmail (and also hotmail to test) address, and it fails every time! http://macosx.com/forums/mac-os-x-system-mac-software/295491-hotmail-now-windows-live-anyone-else-having-problems-w-adium-hotmail-account-2.html

I use gmail for Adium to connect to MSN. ...

OK, Adium seems to be connecting with my Hotmail (oops, excuse me, "Windows Live Hotmail, ooooh fancy!) account now. I guess it took a while before they ironed out all the kinks. Whether the kinks were on Hotmail's part or Adium's part, I do not know. But it's working now.