“Microsoft is aiming to capitalise on the user-generated video phenomenon by launching an online service to compete with YouTube, Google and Yahoo,” BBC News reports.
“Soapbox starts testing on Tuesday and will launch within six months as part of current service, MSN Video,” The Beeb reports. “‘It’s really early days in online video; this is still act one,’ said MSN’s Rob Bennett. YouTube had 34 million visitors last month, according to Nielsen/NetRatings, while MSN Video attracts about 12m. ‘We’re definitely not blind to the fact that YouTube has a big lead right now,’ said Mr Bennett, general manager of MSN’s entertainment and video services.”
“The firm said the service would work with users of computers running both Windows and Apple operating systems and would support browsers including Internet Explorer, Firefox and Safari,” The Beeb reports. “Soapbox will also support a number of video file formats and delivery methods, according to Microsoft.”
Full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Gary” for the heads up.]
Microsoft “innovation” in action yet again.
Investors must be really sick of MS and its inability to break new markets. They are the follower in everything.
Microsoft to design new animals, We’ll beign with a monkey followed by a chicken” said Balmer yesterday
So the question is…will Soapbox videos be “Plays for Sure” or “Zune” compatible, or perhaps MS will be innovative and create a third DRM scheme for this content.
Time for dictionary’s to redefine some of their entries, I think…
‘Imitation’ – see Microsoft
b, that’s what I was going to say, Microsoft in greek means “lazy follower”. It’s laughable…
_ Microsoft to copy successful ideas_
Follow the Soapbox link in the MDN article. There is a dancing MSN butterfly…it’s is so scary it is funny.
At least they’re including Apple compatibility. Someone must have told them that a lot of video editing happens on Macs.
Don’t count Microsoft out because they’re last to market. IE vs Netscape, iPod vs also-rans, Windows vs Mac…. sometimes first doesn’t necessarily mean you’re going to win.
On the other hand, we live in Windows vs Mac Scene II…
They’re pitiful. Profitable. But pitiful.
‘Soapbox will also support a number of video file formats….’
Quicktime™, anyone?
Did anyone’s eyes bug out like mine did when I read that Microsoft is creating a service that is MacOS/Safari compatible, and isn’t from the MBU?
I naturally assumed it would be Windows only like everything else they do, so this new cross-platform stuff seems really weird.
Have you seen the loading icon?
I have seen that spinning thing before… But when? Yeah, it is when I boot my Mac. My mac doesn’t crash, so I haven’t got to reboot often.
MW: Stop, as in, when will MS stop copying?
Microsoft is the ultimate ‘me too’ company.
Yeah that dancing butterfly on the Soapbox link is giving me the creeps.
Whoever that guy is, he needs a better agent.
Hopefully the first video they’ll host is a secret spy cam shot of Ballmer throwing a chair at Kai-Fu Lee after he told Ballmer he was going to Google.
I’m sure they’ll bully their way to some respectable market share.
I get the feeling Microsoft are feeling the need to eat humble pie… Safari mentioned as a browser it will work on?!
Why oh why does MS feel the need th follow and copy every development there is. Why don’t they using their resources to create something original.
Its a mystery.
ballmers dancing is getting better… but how on earth did he fit in that butterfly costume?
M$ needs to spin off every division that isn’t Windows and Office related.
What has Microsoft ever invented? Anything? I’m serious.
Microsoft innovation in action again? No. Microsoft greed in action again.
Well that was a first… I went to the Soapbox page, watched that god-awful video and when I closed the tab, got a windows box up saying “are you sure you want to navigate away from this page?” What the f*ck are they doing? When I closed it, it took Safari down with it. Can you belive that?
Anyone else experience this?
Microsoft belies belief.
The problem I have with Microsoft is that they try to compete in all these different areas for the sake of it. Not because they have a good idea or can bring something good to it or integrate it well with some other market but because they feel they should because they’re big.
I don’t like the way our society has this obsession with everything being bigger and that equating to be being better.
Could this mean that Windows Media and the Windows Media Player will finally be updated for Apple? Be still my beating codec! (Actually, I really haven’t missed it at all–it’s been months since I’ve opened Media Player.)
You can guarantee, if somebody is doing something even mildly sucessful, MS will copy it, or at least announce they will six months to a year before they are actually up and running with the product. That tactic used to work years ago when they announced their vaporware to scare would-be product developers out of a market.
The dancing butterfly guy reminds me of the mexican bee guy on the Simpsons. Ayy yie yie.
How is this for a dud UI – play the dancing butterfly guy and then try to close the window. A weird dialog appears.
To be fair microsoft did invent the world’s first talking paperclip!
hey me…
there is a whole web page focusing on all the great MS innovations – just check out http://www.vcnet.com/bms/departments/innovation.html
Cross platform/browser features are there so that they can eventually be cut. IE7/Vista/256MB video card only, coming right up! With a great big DRM spinach salad that not only tastes like shit, it gives you E. coli, too.
We really are lucky bastards. Microsoft is going to continue solving the world’s problems for us.
The weirdest thing of all is Microsoft’s choice of video to use as a demo. If it were Apple, I think we might see Bono singing an exclusive song, or maybe a cool but unknown band, or at the very least some beautifully shot natural history footage. But Microsoft for some bizarre reason have decided that the ideal demo material is some badly lit footage of a bearded man, dressed as a butterfly, prancing about in an empty disco.
Whenever an advert is proposed, it’s normal to initially consider maybe six alternatives and then select the best one. It may reveal a certain lack of imagination on my part, but I really can’t believe that there could be six proposals that were each worse than that one.
At least they had the sense not to make the poor guy wear brown.
It sums up Microflop’s image quite nicely – a sad, weird, unfashionable tosser alone by himself on the dancefloor.
This is why M$ is the 800 lb. Gorilla
Only Apple has managed to keep it at bay, mainly because Steve and Bill are friends.
Steve stays out of M$ hair, makes M$ look like it’s not nearly as bad of a monopoly because Apple is a worse monopoly. (hardware and software lock)
M$ allows Apple to live. Apple sells crappy OfficeMac.
Apple is M$ R&D department and rare welfare recipient.
Steve knows how to get the money, the pretend competition between M$ and Apple is just a farse.
Doesn’t MS know that YouTube loses wads of money every quarter?
OK, so I go to check out the dancing butterfly. Nothing happens. So I go to close the tab – IT ASKS ME IF I REALLY WANT TO DO THAT!
Pure feakin’ Microshit!
Isn’t MS supposed to spend trillions of dollars on research and development? And that is what they come up with? Another forum for people with a serious lack of life?
Metoosoft
This desperation to be hip and cool is going to kill that company.
Do Ballmer, Gates and Dell text each other and trade video blogs?
Gates: “Dude, we’re going to make our music player.”
Dell: Cool, dude. Yeah, we tried that. It might have sold better if we’d had one in brown.”
Ballmer: <Chewbacca noise>
In related news, Microsoft, having discovered that computers run on electricity, have decided to come up with their own competing format.
Also, having realized that computer users breathe air, they are working on an alternative to air that should be out following the release of Windows Vista.
qka,
I saw the dancing butterfly – lame – and when I closed the window I got the same popup! Incredibly lame! I used to think it was just when they copied Apple that they screwed things up, but this shows they screw up anything they copy.
Bad dancer in a bowling alley?
When I closed the tab it crashed my browser.
Thanks Microsoftopoly.
There is going to be an investor backlash one of these days. This habit of Microsoft of “me-tooing” at every dang market that comes along, only too create yet another money-losing division has got to stop. Microsoft is horribly mis-managed. It’s only because of the gigantic cash-cows that are Windows and Office, that they can afford to be mismanaged.
Oh my God, I clicked on the link and watched that video!!!!! Not only Steve Jobs but many other company CEO’s would literally fire the employee who produced that, let a long post it for the world to see.
On top of it all, I got the same dialog asking if I want t leave and clieck OK, and Safari disappeared and outright quit.
Microsoft is an truly the most unimaginable, univentive most disgusting corporation in existence. IMO.
With all that cash in the bank, they can bully the rest of I guess every company around. Microsoft uses this mey to stifle and intimidate other companies out of business. And if they can’t do that they buy the compnay and shuts it down.
I can oly imagine that Gates and Balmer were so bullied as kids because of their sheer geekness, these use all of there wealth to “get even”.
I think they both are unstable. Keep the meds up boys. Someday you will like yourselves and not have to get even with all of the bullies who pushed you around as kids.
And they both must have approved butterfly man. What more can be said…
M$ BASTARDS YOU MAKE ME SICK!
click the close button on the tab – and:
Are you sure you want to navigate away from this page?
true
Press OK to continue or Cancel to stay on the current page.
YOU FU&&§$’IN ASSHATS! everything you make has those darn error massages
and when i clicked OK, Safari crashed.
thanks Micro-Dipshits!
Given that Soapbox’s slogan is “Make your statement”, I thought the butterfly man quite amusing and appropriate. The humour is similar to the current Get A Mac ads.
its time for Microsoft to go back to their roots! Office only. its about the only thing they are halfway decent at.
They should call it “BoobTube”.
YouTube is first! in What? Losing shitloads of money streaming bad videos for free?
The reason it took down safari was because MS put in some JavaScript that prompted you and if you said yes it would make a loop that would crash safari.
Can someone tell me just why M$ feels the need to dominate *every possible* market?
Did someone deny Gates and Ballmer toys when they were little and now they have to have eveything?
MW: “other” as in “If it belongs to the other, I must have it.”
Microsoft can’t possibly be serious. No wonder they can’t get anything done, they are constantly chasing after “the next big thing.” What little respect I had for the company diminishes further with each vaporware press release they issue.
Steve Balmer really missed his true calling. He should be playing the bad guy in B-movies.
The more MS can think it can bully its way to market share despite sloppy products, the better off we’ll be in the long run
MICROSOFT DOES NOT HAVE TO OWN EVERYTHING! I enjoy living in my Mac world – MacBookPro 17″ – with NO WINDOWS
And the point of this is what? Everyone will upload to youTube and to the new MS tube. Where’s the comparison or difference. It’s like going to the video shop to hire a movie. If you go to Video Ezy or Blockbuster or Video City, they all have the same movies anyway.
Can we all stop wasting time competing with eachother and just stick to what we’re good at.
Apple = iPods
Sony = Playstations
Mercedes = Cars
Kenwood = Speakers
Sara Lee = Ice Cream
TDK = Recordable Media
Microsoft = ..well you get the idea.
A cheap copy of Youtube or Google video….what a surprise!!.
Probably they gonna sync Soupbox to play movies in Zune, but only 3 times before it lock.!! jajajaj …….losers.