Exciting news for all you socialites out there: The Internet, à la industry giant Microsoft Corp. (Nasdaq: MSFT), has finally (finally!) come up with a way to maintain and rekindle friendships online. It's called social networking. And it's totally brand new and completely awesome and not at all something we've already seen recreated a thousand times in the past year alone.
Sorry. I'm trying this new thing, you see, called being facetious. Because the news that Microsoft will be "rolling out" a new social networking platform over the course of the next few months is, at best, dull.
First, a little about the product. Windows Live Wave 3 (hate it already in name alone, yes?) is Microsoft's way of making its Windows Live platform consumer friendly and, of course, "social." The service is being hailed today for its possible eventual ability to let users keep track of their content and activity across third-party sites, as well as across Microsoft Live services (Messenger, Hotmail, etc.).
Confusing. I thought most of these things already existed via stalking services like FriendFeed and Plaxo, and third-party applications on Facebook and Friends?
Well. So what? According to a Microsoft blog, "You can easily pull in your address books from places like Facebook, Hi5, and Bebo, so you don't have to manage multiple networks of friends."
Interesting. But perhaps if you're signed up on all of these sites, you should be more concerned with managing your Multiple Personality Disorder or your multiple hours of time you're clearly not spending at a job of some sort.
Uh. No offense...
Unless they're already hard-core Windows Live users, or have never touched upon a social network before in their life, I don't know of a good reason for users to sign up for yet another me-too network. Perhaps Microsoft will show us why over the next few months, but my doubts are high.
We can't blame Microsoft for trying (albeit a few years too late). They had to do something in this space. But I wonder why it is that the creator of the software industry is now only capable of jumping on the bandwagon rather than spending a little extra time on something truly innovative where the Web is concerned. It's going to take more than the ever-exciting prospect of a Twitter
feed to my social network to make me want to hand over my social graph
data to Microsoft.
I agree with you, Mashka, and I wonder if we'll see the same pattern with its cloud computing OS. Well, we have a while to find out on both fronts because right now Microsoft is "all talk" and no release.
I have a strange feeling, that for the last several years Microsoft lost its intuition.It desperatelly tries to catch up the last trends but failed everytime.I think Microsoft underestimated the meaning of the Internet and bought Mosaic from Spyglass and turned it to Internet explorer.Since then, Microsoft is not on time with everything that concerns the Internet.
Yeah, MS has deep pockets, and even if they start a bit late in the social networking space, this is like an add-on to their Live brandname services, so they're likely to gain not lose. MS might not be that innovative but they seem to be good at thinking "outside the box". For example, they know they can't get more people to use their Live Search just for its quality/performance, but instead, they use things like Cashback or Live Search Club or SearchPerks to get people to do searchs not to find the info they're really looking for but just to earn points and redeem prizes. With the social feature adding to the Windows Live platform, who knows maybe there'll be more incentives from MS on the way.
Chris, that's an interesting prospect. It's also interesting to watch Microsoft pit itself against Facebook in the social space after making a $240 million investment. At the Web 2.0 Summit last week Facebook's CEO didnt' seem to want to respond to whether he thinks Ballmer is happy with the price he paid.
Microsoft has deep pockets but I wonder if they can have some fruitful results as well as most of their live labs initiatives have gone well. MS is not going to have the advantage of early starter rather when other social networks are trying / researching new ways to generate revenue, Microsoft is going to start some thing
Microsoft DID invest quarter of a BILLION dollars in facebook!
On another note, I am a bit or SERIOUSLY worried how their NEW service is going to effect/affect(argh!) other PLATFORM provider's meal ticket Nicole!!
Often the behomoths are generous enough to leave plenty for the ecosystem....and initially feed it enough for prosperity of smaller fish...but emotionally it is somewhat daunting to KNOW that much of the big fish are about to be eaten up.
Classic example is IBuySpyPortal from asp.net forums which spawned DotNetNuke however Sharepoint Server Systems emerged near simultaneously and are competing products..although, I was able to attend a Microsoft Mini Code Camp at their Charlotte campus in 2005 that covered BOTH sharepoint and dnn in one scoop which was rather interesting.
If you'll excuse me now as I'm going to shed some tears..I still love Microsoft though!
Nicole, One thing is for certain, Microsoft won't run out of money supporting Windows Live Wave 3. Maybe their aligning themselves for the inevitable consolidation of yet another IT industry. There will be some low hanging fruit to pick from in the coming months.
Would you say the majority of Microsoft customers contribute to web traffic or are active contributors within the blogosphere? Perhaps this is another step towards serving customers better and attracting more contributors to the Internet’s evolution.
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