Sounds like things are going really well with the Beta and WLM. I'm glad they are open to new ideas and all from people not on the development team. It would definitely be fun to try out the Beta, and those who get invites better give plenty of details as to what's going on.
And, yes, I hope this isn't the only meeting of its kind. We (the general user population) could definitely use this sort of thing to get our ideas and questions to the Messenger team more effectively.