August 1st, 2008
Poll: How would you rebrand Live Search?
Will Microsoft ultimately rebrand Live Search with a new, more user-friendly name?
I recently received a tip from someone in the know about a few of the possible names for Live Search that the Redmondians allegedly have considered during the past year. The tipster said Microsoft’s Search team was running quite a few names past users, and that the three leading candidates for a new name for Live Search were:
- Bing
- Hook
- Kumo (which means either “cloud” or “spider” in Japanese, depdnding on which Kanji characters are used)
(Bing.com currently is the name of an Australian mail-automation company. Hook.com is a dating site. And CSC owns Kumo.Com.)
Not too surprisingly, it sounds like the Search team was none too fond of any of these choices. “Bing it!” “Hook it!” “Kumo it!” Naaah….
Then Microsoft made its bid for Yahoo — which potentially could have resulted, if that deal had come to pass, in putting Live Search under the “Yahoo Search” brand.
Microsoft officials have said that the company knows it needs to fix its Live Search branding. But still no word on exactly what that means or when it might happen.
[Poll=25]
(Other suggestions for a new name for Live Search are welcome in the Talkbacks.)
Do you think Microsoft’s search share would grow if it had a better brand for its search engine?
Mary Jo has covered the tech industry for more than 20 years. Don't miss a single post. Subscribe via Email or
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