Kumo becomes the new Microsoft buzz word
Microsoft’s purchase of a new domain name has prompted speculation that it will use it as a new home for its web-base software. Another theory has it that kumo.com will become the site for a revamped Microsoft search engine.
The speculation began when it emerged Microsoft has not only bought the domain name kumo.com, but is already routing traffic to the site through its own servers, specifically those used for the Live search.
Theory number one is thus that Kumo will become the new name for Live Search, a possibility that was first floated back in August. There’s some logic to that: once Windows 7 gets released, many previous Windows components will become downloads from the Windows Live service, which will presumably become more prominent. While the two services are separate, Microsoft may want to rebrand Live Search to avoid confusion or any overt links between its software and search services.
The other main strand to this argument is that ‘kumo’ can mean ‘spider’ in Japanese. Given Microsoft is reportedly interested in gaining a bigger foothold in Asia, there would be some logic in the idea of ‘spider’ – literally the center of a web — as a search engine name. (Lycos, one of the earlier successful search engines, took its name from a Latin term for a spider.)
However, ‘kumo’ can also mean ‘cloud’ in Japanese (the two words are pronounced in the same way, similar to ‘blue’ and ‘blew’ in English). That would seem to lend itself to Microsoft’s plans for cloud computing: providing web-based software along the lines of Hotmail, possibly involving online editions of Office or even an operating system itself.
Given that one of the selling points of cloud computing is that the software should theoretically work regardless of the user’s computer set-up, there’d certainly be some logic in using a more generic term in the hope of attracting subscribers who run Macs or even Linux-based systems.
Related Posts:
