Microsoft closing YouTube rival
Microsoft Vice President and MSN leader Erik Jorgensen
(Credit: Microsoft)Microsoft is closing Soapbox, its onetime video-sharing rival to Google's YouTube, the company said Tuesday.
Last month, Microsoft told CNET News it planned to significantly scale back Soapbox. Now it turns out Soapbox will be scaled all the way down to nothing.
"We have decided to shut down the Soapbox feature," said Microsoft Vice President and MSN leader Erik Jorgensen in an e-mail. "Beginning today, July 21, we will be notifying both our customers and our internal and external partners that on July 29th, people will no longer be able to upload videos to Soapbox and on August 31st, the service will no longer be available."
Microsoft will continue to support MSN Video, which has 88 million unique users each month and delivers 480 million video streams each month, he said. Soapbox was responsible for less than 5 percent of MSN Video's streams.
"Though we'll be retiring the Soapbox service in its current form, we are committed to user-generated content and our other video offerings through MSN Video," Jorgensen said. "We also plan to add functionality into MSN Video to easily enable bloggers and citizen journalists to upload content to share with our MSN users. Video remains an important and growing area within our overall content strategy."
Microsoft launched soapbox in 2006, but it never caught on as widely as YouTube. Google's in-house offering, Google Video, didn't either, but Google has chosen to support it.
The unwritten part is that if they can close one that they no doubt were "committed too" they can close the other.
2. massive marketing campaign
3. bunch of articles claiming it is a revolutionary product
4. ???
5. loss of profit
6. user information used for targeted ad placement
7. ???
8. profit
bonus: none of the privacy backlash google gets
...at least until someone notices :)
Remember .mac?
Now it's MobileMe.
Hmm.
and fail miserably...
MS products like Windows Server, Hyper-V, .Net Framework, Silverlight... all garbage.
On second thought, maybe you are just a troll.
Perhaps instead of Soapbox, this should have been called Bandwagon, as in what MS jumps on all the time. Yes, I know they're not the only ones.
I know there aren't that many o/s companies out there, but MS hasn't really invented anything. I'm not intimately familiar with everything they have done, but I can't think of anything that's really invented by MS. Sure, sure, they have patented lots of code, however IMAO I don't think programming code should be patentable unless you invented the language it's written in, the compiler that reduces it to machine language and the hardware that interprets that ML.
I do think companies should be able to copyright their code, but just not patent it. Other than code, can anyone come up with something invented by MS? My best guess is the IR mouse, maybe the laser mouse (not sure about those though).
OK, so they have been successful with XBox (congrats), but it's not like they invented the video game industry. Anything else? Anyone? Anyone?
They also invented InkSeine, Personal Audio Space, Flying Bike, Wimobot, and lots more every year that Microsoft Research Labs invents.
If you want to find out more, just search up Microsoft Research Labs summit. They put up extraordinary as well as cool inventions every year.
Also, most of what Microsoft does is innovation (making inventions into viable products or combining inventions for making life easier in general), but the inventions that they do seem to go largely unnoticed. However, part of that is because they tend to seamlessly integrate inventions into their products, and the rest go to a certain Microsoft IP Ventures.
This Microsoft IP Ventures group or department or whatever licenses the technologies they create and sometimes even start up whole new companies.
Microsoft does invent a lot of things, but most people don't care about it enough. But then again, Microsoft Research labs are almost always one of the best places to work in for an enthusiastic computer scientist whatever country you're in.
On the Web, you need to innovate and try to be first. No point in watching others succeed and then trying to compete later. A bit like trying to compete with Wikipedia. If you are not first or at least early enough you are last and history.
BTW, .Net, Xbox, etc are all copies. .Net was orginally Java and Java is still much bigger than .Net.
Microsoft doesn't understand the Net and never have.
Case in point: MSN was originally a BBS that competed with the Internet.
Another case in point: Bill Gates original book, "The Road Ahead". It makes no mention of the Internet, and then Bill had to change "Information Superhighway" for the word "Internet" in the following edition. How embarrassing considering the title of the book.
If Bill couldn't get the Net, then there is no way that Steve B can and so we see that the no1 Internet company is a company that gets it and is 110% dedicated to it. That company is of course Google.
Microsoft just has too many other legacy products to support and focus on and a part time focus on the Web is not a winning Web strategy.
They took the concept of a home PC and changed it from a hobby to a mainstream business model. They unified the various OS's that were split into a focused standard that others could then work with. Instead of running Texas Instruments, Commodore, OS 2, and Apple, now we run Apple and Windows.
Like them or hate them as you will, but we don't have the fragmented and wild days of the 80's where nothing was compatible with anything else.
Face it. Microsoft is a lame duck on the Web.
Yes, they won the OS war for PCs.
But they missed the Internet boat and history will show that this boat is bigger than all the others.
At least their consistency is comforting.
Next to fail: Microsoft retail stores. LOL!
*pops some popcorn*
After all they came up with Bing and the Zune before anyone else.
:(
=
And yes. Google has two services, but I don't really consider Google a video service. More a video search engine that you happen to be able to upload videos to.
The Bejing Olympics and NBC
Netflix and it's streaming technology
Xbox 360 and it's streaming technology
While it may not be as popular as flash and youtube Microsoft is making in roads and to be honest here, it is just a better experience then Flash. No onle streams 1080i/1080p content like Silverlight.
For who?
Microsoft shareholders?
With my experiences with Silverlight, I'm not surprise, Silverlight is simply terrible, and Microsoft makes an extra effort to make sure it's not reverse compatible with Firefox or any other browser but Internet Explorer.
Also, I don't think it's right to include any of these:
The Bejing Olympics and NBC
Netflix and it's streaming technology
Xbox 360 and it's streaming technology
Considering they are all either owned by or have company shares with Microsoft. Of course products that are owned by the same company as the makers of Silverlight are going to use Silverlight as a cattleprod.
Unless you've been living under a rock, or simply don't care, you can plainly see how MS functions when it comes to new products, they don't steal from other software companies, they 'borrow' the idea and reform it into their own crappy manifestation. Been happening since the dawn of DOS.
Another MS product fails, 6 more lined up behind it, big deal and good riddance.
Silverlight works well for me in Firefox
Gaming: Nobody gave them a chance at first, but now look at the position they are in. Just look up console sales over the last few years. Just look at they xbox platform as a whole and compare it to sony and nintendo, there's really no comparison as far as features and entertainment options. That's not even considering the fall update that will include features such as facebook, twitter, xm radio, and instant video streaming, and group watch through netflix.
The moral of my post: Don't be a nay sayer and discount everything microsoft does simply becuase you love apple and google.
My point is that it is entertaining watching them come up with crap stuff with silly names and then years later watching it fall over. Bing, Zune, Bob, etc,
The next copy target for Microsoft could be Twitter.
Maybe there one will be called ******* or Tweetbloat. Who knows.
Better than a soap opera.
Thanks for the laughs Microsoft.
Rival: One that equals or almost equals another in a particular respect.
1. Someone has a good product
2. MS makes a competing product
3. you all rush to places like this to trash it and MS
4. You call MS a complete failure even though they are the third most profitable company in the world
5. in 3-5 years you are back here crying because MS now owns the market in the product you trashed 3/5 years earlier and state that they somehow "cheated"
6. You crawl back into your hole and wait for the next so called MS failure
I do agree with you there ... at least it hasn't yet but at least they are finally on to something this time.
But they may succeed this time if not undoubtly they will be back because Microsoft to big to mean an to well resource to continue be a utter failure in the search market but hopefully they will provide at least some competition for google and competition is always good.
- by eldernorm July 23, 2009 11:22 AM PDT
- To Randy620 and others that just LOVE M$. I have to disagree and submitt the following.
- Like this Reply to this comment
-
(45 Comments)Standard Micro$oft B$. :-)
Microsoft will continue to support OS2 until their new windows os comes out, then their deal with IBM can jump in the trash..... :-)
Microsoft will continue to support plays-for-sure, until the Zune comes out....
Microsoft will continue to support Soapbox, until .... er later today....
Microsoft will continue to support ........ enter in any Microsoft service.... here ________, until they feel that they are not making enough money from it.... then it crashes.. Sucks to be an MS user.. :-(
Microsoft will continue to support MSN Video until they feel it cost to much. Sucks to be an M$ supporter. :-(
Micro$oft has bought into more services, OSs, companies, etc and then either killed them or left them to rot that I have lost track. M$ only supports M$. Users are just people to be used. Sucks to be a user. :-( ,
Internet explorer had a 95% share of the browser market,,,,, er 90%,.... 86%...... er 81%..... er 75%,..... oppps make that about 68%currently of the browser market. I wonder where it will be next year.??? The trend is clear. Down, down,down
Just a thought.
en