RSSMSN In Need of an Image Makeover?
By Nate Mook | Published March 15, 2005, 1:41 PM
In recent months, Microsoft's MSN online services arm has released several products that it sees as "very cool." Most of them, however, have received a lukewarm reception by both early adopters and the media, leaving some MSN employees frustrated and confused as to what exactly they are doing wrong.
An internal debate began within Microsoft after veteran engineer turned Google employee Mark Lucovsky wrote in his Web log that Microsoft no longer knew how to "ship" software. He noted that work from Microsoft engineers could take years to reach customers while "software as a service" companies such as Amazon and Google deliver improvements overnight.
Has Microsoft lost the magic touch -- Is Microsoft software passé?
Many Microsoft employees were quick to refute Lucovsky's points, noting that Windows cannot be compared to Web services. But the perception of Microsoft as a slow-mover has begun to sink in within the confines of Redmond.
Mike Torres, Lead Product Manager for MSN Spaces, complained about the image issue in his Web log last week. "Some of the fallout from the [Lucovsky] debate was interesting. In comment threads on Scoble's blog and elsewhere, people were saying some interesting things about MSN," Torres wrote. "MSN is playing catch-up to Google and Yahoo," one person opined. Another wrote: "MSN isn't cool, I would never use it."
"Obviously I take some of that to heart," Torres said.
Torres and other employees have also been disheartened by the lack of media coverage of Microsoft's recent accomplishments. For example, Google's launch of its Maps service was met with virtual applause while improvements to MSN Maps & Directions went practically unnoticed.
"For some reason, services like Gmail and Yahoo's Search APIs tend to get a lot more play amongst "sneezers" than things like Outlook Live! or MSN Video," said Torres.
MSN Program Manager Dare Obasanjo shared such concerns after the media extensively covered Yahoo's Search Developer Network and all but ignored the similar ability of MSN to offer search results as RSS feeds.
"I saw more buzz about YSDN than about the MSN Search feeds from various corners. I suspect that the lack of "oomph" in the announcement is the cause of this occurrence," said Obasanjo.
In order to understand and fix the problem, MSN's Torres asked for opinions from users. "Honestly? MSN dumbs things down," one reply read. "There's the fact that I can’t find anything. I've been using MSN for years, and there are still things I don't know MSN does."
Another user complained of MSN's dropping of free Outlook access to Hotmail accounts, which he said was handled poorly and looked as if Microsoft was trying to make money by pushing users to its Outlook Live program. "It was instantly perceived as 'MS is forcing free accounts to paid ones'," he wrote.
Torres is hopeful people will once again be excited by MSN's services and admits that, right now, MSN is only "pretty good." The company is already testing what it calls "incubation projects" to bring back the buzz, including a personalized Start page that serves as an aggregator of content from user-defined RSS feeds.
"The point is to discover what we could do better to cater to early adopters short of changing our name to something silly sounding or killing the butterfly," said Torres. "How can we get early adopters (and the media for that matter) to speak of MSN in a positive light?"
Since they used MSN Maps as an example, here's some specific comments on that service:
1) The map size is horribly small compared to Googles. On my monitor, the Google map is almost 8 times the size of the MSN map.
2) Clutter. The ad on the MSN site takes up almost as many square inches as the actual map. 14 square inches for the map on my monitor vs 8 square inches of advertisement. And so much wasted space trying to keep the page 8 inches wide. I'm only running at 1280x1024 on a 17 inch monitor, and that leaves me with a 5 inch band on the right that's completely wasted.
3) Basic usability. When I put an address in on MSN, the default zoom is so far out that I can't see the surrounding streets well. They essentially give me "city view". Google gives me a "neighborhood view," zoomed in so I can get a good look at surrounding streets and their names. MSN only gives me 3 or 4 major arteries. I have to zoom in to get a better look.
4) Advanced usability. Here's an MSN link, the address changed:
http://mappoint.msn.com/
(zudlqx45cny0a3vfhvruix30)/
map.aspx?L=USA&C=41.65269%2c-91.57834&A=7.16667&
P=|41.65269%2c-91.57834|
123+Fake+Street%2cFake+Town%2cST+12345|L1|
[edit: The msn url is either too long, malformed or otherwise breaks the comment code and is not displaying correctly. I tried to break it onto several lines, so we'll see if that works. The fact that the google link just worked helps prove my point.]
Here's the same in Google:
http://maps.google.com/maps?q=123 fake street, any town, st 12345&hl=en
Which one is easier to construct if you want to make a quick link on your website to a map to your house?
These are the big differences between the 2 that I saw and why the MSN feature isn't worth visiting or using.
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|I remember fiddling on a commodore 64 and then later the commodore amiga...I was forced to go pc-clone cause commodore went broke and you could'nt rely on enough software and hardware to keep up with the joneses...whatelse is different these days ? with all the mhz speed and crazy amounts of ddr ram I could fly an amiga to mars and get back with plenty of innovations...and still they want to be "cool"? I have bought a 64bit mb and cpu only to wait for microsoft to come up with the apropiate OS...? wanna be cool ? I even pay for my OS and still I cant get it when I want, I have to wait...wait....and wait...that should be one reason to drop them or to label them NOT COOL !!!! maybe they are not cool because they are so filthy rich and keep overcharging their slowpoke products...basically they are not bad...its just that If I'dd have to wait so long it would be nice to have so much money...I'dd go on a trip to mars and by the time I got back I'dd be happy with what they came up with...
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|I've seen this happen to other blue-chip IT shops. Throughout the 90's, many blue-chip companies with internal IT development organizations shot from the hip when it came to application development and time-to-market delivery. Sure the applications where a bit buggy but the developers worked around the clock to fix the release and before you know it you went from 4.0.0 to 4.10.3.
What happened? Processes, differentiating yourself in the market by offering quality over quantity, government reviews, complaints, etc... IT shops battened down the hatches, tightened their loose grip on developers to ensure only quality was delivered to the market. These new policies applied to all development groups, regardless of the nature of your application or service. Developers are restricted on innovating. I speak from the mind and heart. I have been a part of the migration from off-the-cuff development to being overly standardized to the point of ridicality. It takes the fun and joy out of being a creative developer.
It seems to me that multiple software development life cycles need to be nurtured in the corporate environment, one that can foster quick delivery methodologies and one that enforce strict quality. I think Microsoft has been burned on quality in the past and with their bordering-on-a-monopoly stature, they cannot afford any major snaffus so if they are going to err, they will err on the side of caution. In some companies, I've begun seeing a reverse trend and hopefully it will bode well for the consumer.
Google cheats in this arena and I like it. They put out their near-perfect concoctions on a beta site, Google Labs, to give you the consumer a taste for what is coming but use it at your risk because it may have flaws. The well-tauted Google Maps had its own flaws when I first did a search for pizza near my zip code it displayed a pizza joint right next door to me with an address across town. I laughed at this obvious error but also couldn't wait to see the finalized product. Has it migrated from Google Labs yet? No, its still found under the pesky Google Labs icon (although it has an easy enough URL to remember) but that doesn't stop me from using it, showing it to my friends and figuring out ways to use it both professionally and personally.
As for MSN, yes, Virginia, they shot themselves in the foot with that ridiculous butterfly. How does a butterfly relate to the Internet? The Internet is not akin to a stroll through the park. I think their marketing team (outsourced??) pulled the wool over management's eyes on that one.
As always, I can only encourage you by saying "If you don't like, don't support it". Not using MSN and encouraging all of your friends and family not to look at MSN as a viable option goes a LOT farther to bringing the product to an early demise than any argumentative posting. Microsoft will not hang up the towel on MSN becaues there are hundreds of hateful Blogs but they will if nobody is buying into it.
The power is in the consumer.
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|microsoft or msn? make up your mind! Yes they are all under the microsoft name but are under different shops. As far as MSN being cool, the article only seems to be talking about stupid things like "image" not software. In otherwords it has no buzz, but that's because it hasn't done anything. You can't just be the same and expect buzz.
As for microsoft, it is in a development cycle where it isn't creating any new products. In a year or two it will be all longhorn or win64 or visualstudio 2005 or sql 2005, IE7 etc. It would be more worrisome to them if they released all those products and got no buzz. MSN should stop whining and create something other than stupid butterfly ads
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|Right from the beginning that butterfly thing kept me away from the whole MSN factory. Like if we're all a bunch of little kids (and maybe are in MS eyes) having our own playground. I remeber my elemtary school when we where settled up with LOGO a kind of mosaic game for children. MS please have a look at Queer as Folks those producers know how to set a trend they even know how to give the role of Brian a job as concept maker, fake in the series but they know what people want and thats why this role is so good, it is just nothing else as the real world!
But sure (I'm not sure) MS wouldn't allow persons as me to give a Queer as Folks Job within MS or was it a Queer as Folks person who invented the Rainbow Butterly? Very confusing MS! I guess it was a person who tried to be Queer only... LOL
MS do something on the way how you treat people as dummies, they are basically if it comes down in using Windows, but you dont have to scream it from the roofs and monitor screens with butterflies and paperclips... Just pretend that everybody is as professional as your programmers... Layout a professional screen like many others do (like Apple does) think how people think but don't try to think how people think!
Goodness I could go on for hours like this and I'm so surprised that a company like MS is not moving with time or moving very slow. Looks like Philips (yes I'm Dutch) always good ideas but loosing the best deals because of moving like a snail!
Google it up I would say. Google is maybe not in all markets but know how to move their a** and having balls to do so, stay away from the meeting table react fast, handle fast...
Cheers Mr. Gates! marioindonesia@gmail.com just to let you know i'm on gmail and same as others invited now that's what you call marketing!
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|I have to agree that I feel that MSN does not get as much news coverage. I didn't even know they had a maps service - and it covers Australia as well, unlike other map services - until I read this article. Come to think of it, I remember Betanews covering the Google maps, yet I don't recall seeing the article regarding changes MSN's map service on Betanews' front page despite a link being included in this article. Perhaps I just missed it, I don't know.
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|MSn just plain bites. Its like AOL for MS shills. Microsoft should just get out of the ISP business all together and concintrate on making a more secure OS and web browser.
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|MSN is an online service, not an internet service provider. an internet service provider provides dialup access to the internet and that is all. the end user is on their own for apps to ftp, mail, web browse and other things
an online service provides not only access to the internet via either dialup or broadband, but also includes a front end or bundled application package.
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|or they should do what they do with everything else, create their own internet, and only allow licensed users to use their network.
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|As a software engineer, it seems to me that the problem can be found in the idea of one of the first sentences in the story: "Microsoft's MSN online services arm has released several products that it sees as "very cool.""
The key idea is that it saw the products as cool. I have seen many times in development that the developer see something as cool but the customer does not see it that way because they don't need it. The target audience should be consulted to see what it wants, not what the developer wants. That should take place at the start.
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|I'm surprised no one has mentioned the butterfly ads. These probably turned off about 45% of the population: straight males. It didn't attract any coolness factor, and likely scared quite a few people away.
As for image, I vowerd never to touch msn again since back in 1996 I gave it a shot on a modem as opposed to AOL (ick, but not as bad back then) and it never worked right. Never tried it again.
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|Microsoft is a big, stodgy, stiff corporation, and it shows. That's not necessarily a bad thing. When I think of what I want in an operating system, I want big, solid and reliable. I don't want hip and cool stuff that'll burn out my hardware. The only way to have "old and reliable" and the "cool factor" of a startup would be to voluntarily spin off part of the company. But when one tries to be old and reliable and cool at the same time, well, they just end up making stiff gyrations like the aforementioned movie reference--something we all find laughable.
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|We've all seen and been not-so-impressed with the limited abilities of Google's apps. But at least Google is trying. What Microsoft did to customers with Hotmail was criminal, but what Google did with Gmail was divine. On the other hand, MSN Desktop Search runs circles around GDS and is highly programmable while consuming far less memory. Bottom line, Microsoft is a software company, not a web services company. As the world has s***ed away from web pages to blogs and RSS feeds, Microsoft has had to reconsider its direction so as not just to say, "We did it... too!"
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|Kill the butterfly and change the name. Seriously, Torres, you've got a good idea.
Rename MSN without 'MS' or 'Network'.
Maybe MSN should be renamed dot Net.
Then .NET could be renamed 'Metamorphosis Platform' or something that makes it sound innovative instead of a domain extension.
Rename Windows Media Audio ... rename everything. With Longhorn on the way and Windows Media 10 out , it's about time to start new brand names and a new numbering system.
Microsoft's terrible ideas of making their software/applications more attractive have included turning their logo into a friendly butterfly (WTF?), animating a dog that complicates the simple task of searching one's computer, animating a paper clip that complicates Office's help, and most of us here will remember Microsoft's 'Bob' concept.
Microsoft should perhaps see about acquiring StarDock and bringing some innovators in who can make using MSN and other Microsoft applications a joy rather than cheese.
[shrugs]. The best thing is that Microsoft is showing concern. AOL was out-of-touch a few years back and has made impressive innovations to stay on-top. I hope to see the same from Microsoft. It's good for competition.
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|Well, to be fair, Stardock isn't exactly loved. The same people backing away from the new MSN are the same ones who despise Stardock, for whatever reason.
Personally, MS is in a unique position and they are struggling majorly. They have two groups of users: highly knowledgable computer enthusiasts and the new users who know almost nothing. They are trying to appease both sides and failing miserably.
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|I couldn't agree more.
Right now everything MSN sucks. The butterfly is stupid. Idiots dressed as a butterfly on TV and at Microsoft events are stupid.
MSN does need renamed. The MSN page has looked about the same for almost 5 years. I mean it has changed a little bit here and there but the only big thing that's changed is the freaking huge ads you see if you use Internet Explorer.
Come on Microsoft, just admit that Google is better and leave it at that. Let Google make a better browser, and a better OS and a better IM client. Leave blogging to Google. Don't come up with some dumb thing called MSN Spaces and then make the web addresses for people's blogs hard to remember. If someone needs to go to a blog hosted by blogger they simply go to blogname.blogspot.com. With MSN's dumb idea you have to go to spaces.msn.com/members/blogname. Why all the added folders? What crap.
Oh well......it's like beating a dead horse.
Move along.....nothing to see here.
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|renaming wont change a single thing... a horse by any other name is still a horse..
ms IS a software company, and are trying toi be a services company but their approach and attitude is all wrong.
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|in defense of stardock.. they have a history of overachieving and being unappreciated, I have been a customer since the os/2 days when stardock scoffed and ridiculed windows.
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|"Microsoft engineers could take years to reach customers"
Nobody can spend more money, and utilize more people, to accomplish less ...than Microsoft.
It truly ~is~ The Hapless Giant !
The Computer Rodent
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|"Nobody can spend more money, and utilize more people, to accomplish less ...than Microsoft."
You obviously never heard about that strange beast called 'government'
Lucky you.
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|Microsoft things that they're products are "Cool" and with it. Apparently they are living on another planet- any one see those hideous MSN watches? I wouldn't be caught dead wearing one....
BTW- I should know about that last comment about the government. I work for the county government and it takes 5 people to do the job of one normal every day person.
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|IMHO the problem starts with Microsoft’s idea that people are going to use them weather they like it or not.
I’m sure the average user with a new XP install and MSN as the home page will click on a few links because they are there but I doubt they would go to MSN because it’s better than anything else.
I don’t want to start a MS bashing session here, but I use the tool that is best for the job in hand. I like to look at a few options and choose the best one for my needs. If I want news, I go to the BBC (I’m in the UK) web search: Google, Maps: Map24, Email: Gmail. MSN doesn’t interest me because it’s ok at a load of stuff not really good at one thing. Just like Microsoft.
Ms are using the Windows business model one MSN, assuming that they have a captive audience that they can pipe anything to rather than trying to be better than anyone else.
I don’t know about you, but I don’t like having 150 links on one page alone!
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|I counted.. it was only 149 which is considered ok.. 150 is a bad thing but 149 is def 100% more desireable
*ducks laughing like a hyena*
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|You counted? I used a text editor with a find and replace...still, I guess you're an MSN fan...
:-P
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|AFAIC, I have been testing for MSn for few years now. I have to agree with the fact that the products they are releasing right now are getting boring. the last things that really thrilled me were MSN Explorer8 and 9 because they really were innovative and even they are paid subscription services, we were getting good thingsd or the price.
yet now i'm just bored. i'm not against MS in general as NOBODY can claim to be anti MS because everyone has ever used a MS software and still use MS Word...
The big thing now is that MSN does not innovate. the Messenger 7 beta took all the features from Yahoo (winks=Y!Audibles, Nudge=Y!Buzz Backround=Y!IMEnvirronment...)...
It's been few months now that Yahoo has decided to work for Firefox users (ysearchblog.com), and what do we see now? MSN too! lol that's hilarious!
The spaces could be a could concept for networking people but i'm already sure that the Yahoo 360 (360.yahoo.com) will be much better and much more mature.
As for the search engine...there are only two for me Goolge and Y! as well because there are simply the best.
i'm not expeting something special for the Longhorn release ...which when MSN Explorer 10 is supposed to be released...
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|no, I was being facetious :) sarchastic and such. I am NO fan of anything microsoft
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|eunichman, I know, thats what the :-P was for! I was being sarcastic back at you.
guillaumeb, can you explain what you mean when you say "NOBODY can claim to be anti MS because everyone has ever used a MS software and still use MS Word..."
I can't decide if you are joking or not! I really am anti-MS in quite a big way and I don't use anything from them.
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