MOOL is a subscription service that provides a leased copy of Outlook to subscribers, along with the MSN Outlook connector, a Hotmail email address with 2GB of storage, and the ability to send messages with attachments up to 20 MB in size. The version of Outlook that comes with MOOL is essentially the same one found in Office Standard, but without some of the foreign language tools.

When you consider the cost of a Hotmail Plus account, and the anti-spam and anti-virus features offered, it's a good value for an Outlook license, especially if you like to upgrade soon after new versions are released. As long as you remain a MOOL subscriber, you'll be able to use the latest versions of Outlook as they're released.

If you already own a license for Outlook and subscribe to MSN Premium, you won't need MOOL, unless you need another license for Outlook, because MSN Premium includes the connector. You will need to install the latest version of the MSN browser software to install the connector though. You may be able to do a custom install and choose just the connector if you don't want the browser installed.

So what's the MSN Outlook connector? It's is a MAPI transport for Outlook 2002 and 2003 that syncs Outlook with your MSN accounts, offering many of the advantages of an Exchange mailbox to MSN subscribers. The connector lets you set the MSN mailbox as your default message store, allowing you to easily sync appointments, contacts, and tasks between Outlook and MSN (but not appointments shared with you by other MSN/Hotmail users).

This means if you set appointments with reminders using the Web interface, they're synced with Outlook and will fire as long as the MSN mailbox is set as your default. If you have POP3 accounts in your profile, and the MSN account is your default account, the mail collected from your POP3 accounts will be copied to the online MSN mailbox unless you use rules to move it to another PST.

While the big selling point is a subscription license for Outlook 2003, the MSN Outlook connector offers improved syncing capabilities for all Outlook folders. If you have Outlook 2000 or earlier, you can't use the connector without upgrading to a newer version, and you'll need to purchase MOOL. Although the connector works with both Outlook 2002 and Outlook 2003, it works better with Outlook 2003.