Microsoft Alters Branding of Confusing .NET Strategy

Associated Press | January 9, 2002

[HAL9000]

SEATTLE (AP) - For a time, just about everything at Microsoft Corp. was .NET-this and .NET-that. Now, the company is quietly retreating from a marketing strategy that some analysts say was a bad idea from the start.

Part of the problem, they say, is that while Microsoft was adding the .NET (pronounced "dot-net") tag to its software products, many people were unable to figure out just what it was.

The Redmond, Wash.-based software company is taking the .NET tag off Windows Server 2003, a key product to be released this spring. It also is evaluating the ubiquitous name's use on other software.

Instead, Microsoft is reworking its marketing and will promote the .NET brand - Microsoft's fancy word for software plumbing - by attaching a logo.

The move is to help Microsoft articulate what many criticize as its arcane and vague strategy in the emerging field of "Web services."

"We wanted to make sure we're clear and crisp in our naming and as consistent as we can be," said Neil Charney, director of Microsoft's platform strategy group for .NET.

.NET is Microsoft's name for the technological framework it's building into its software that will support "Web services." As envisioned by companies such as Microsoft and IBM, Web services will allow computers to communicate, regardless of network, system, device, language or application.

This interoperability means, for instance, that a supplier would automatically know when to send inventory to a manufacturer because their respective systems interact without humans.

Just five months after Microsoft announced its next computer server operating system would be called Windows .NET Server 2003, it is pulling the .NET tag from the update for the powerful software that drives Internet computers.

The technology in the product - one of the biggest expected from Microsoft this year - and its expected April release are unchanged, Charney said.

By marking software with a ".NET connected" logo as opposed to putting it in the name, Microsoft can extend the use of the .NET tag to independent software vendors who write software based on the technology, Charney said.

.NET never should have been used as the umbrella brand that it became, said Ted Schadler, principal software analyst for Forrester Research.

In some ways, Microsoft's .NET branding has damaged its push to sell companies on the idea of Web services, he said. IBM, which calls its version of the services "WebSphere," has been disciplined in spreading its message, he said.

"Microsoft is a land of smart technical marketers, but not smart consumer marketers," Schadler said. IBM's "positioning has been less about the technology and more about the overarching label of coolness."

[HAL9000]

"We wanted to make sure we're clear and crisp in our naming and as consistent as we can be," said Neil Charney, director of Microsoft's platform strategy group for .NET.

Dot-Net needs a new name. How about "Microsoft Bob 2.0"?

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[Robert_Paulson2]

So what is microsloop trying to patent, copyright or trademark now... the "dot" character as in "period" on your keyboard "every time you finish a sentence bull guts gets a quarter?"

Or they trying to get a patent, copyright, or trademark on the file extention "net" or "Net"? Or perhaps the individual letter in NET, like N or E or T?

pathetic

[Jeff Chandler]

Web services will allow computers to communicate, regardless of network, system, device, language or application.

Isn't that what XML is for?

[Libertarianize the GOP]

http://www.freerepublic.com/perl/bump-list

[patriot5186]

I'm glad they're changing this. It was a source of confusion when I'd try to explain .Net to others in my company. I wonder if they'll remote it from Minesweeper.Net too?

[visualops]

"the powerful software that drives Internet computers"


uh..yeah...

[TrappedInLiberalHell]

See this article from the Onion: Microsoft Patents Ones, Zeroes

[Revolting cat!]

Have our local MS shills gotten the memo? We shall see, as they emerge from the 2000 bushes and start claiming that, why, nothing's amiss, it was planned this way all along and there is no change! I love watching the yes-men squirm!

[Joe Bonforte]

.NET never should have been used as the umbrella brand that it became, said Ted Schadler, principal software analyst for Forrester Research.

This guy is exactly right. .NET is some fabulous technology, but plastering the .NET brand on everything they make just made it impossible for anyone to understand what .NET was all about.

I'm always amused by those folks that talk about how Microsoft's products are crap, and they just sell because of good marketing. Microsoft's marketing is very poor. Microsoft's products sell because they're good enough to get by, and very cost-effective, not because they are well-marketed.

[jz638]

I haven't yet heard a convincing argument about how dotnet does anything better than existing technology (aside from boosting enrollment at tech training companies)

[HAL9000]

Microsoft's marketing may not be very good, but it's good enough and it's better than the actual quality of their products.

[Bush2000]

That's pretty funny coming from you, the Apple shill. Apple has approximately 0.0001% of the server market.

[HAL9000]

That's pretty funny coming from you, the Apple shill. Apple has approximately 0.0001% of the server market.

According to data from Gartner Dataquest, Apple had a a 1.2 percent share of the server market last year, but an annual growth rate of 273.8 percent, the fastest rate in the survey. Now that the Xserve is out, I expect Apple to grow their marketshare more over time.

I consider myself fortunate to have my own personal human punching bag for an opponent in debates about the trends in the computer industry. Thanks for stopping by.

[UCANSEE2]

Darn, I had to read this to find out I was confused. I thought that they were releasing new software called CONFUSING.NET as a new market strategy.

[dfwgator]

I've always considered Microsoft as much of a marketing company as a software company. They may not appeal as much to techies, but they manage to get through to the people who make buying decisions, and that's what matters in the end.

[coar]

XML is a way of storing data in a file. But the data can be "described". XML Web Services are just connectors into applications or environments that use XML to communicate.

It's like saying that English is now the world wide common language. If you want to get something from France, and your in Russia, then you can talk to France in English and they will understand you.

[AndrewC]

Your most unhappy customers are your greatest source of learning. --- Bill Gates

[Bush2000]

According to data from Gartner Dataquest, Apple had a a 1.2 percent share of the server market last year, but an annual growth rate of 273.8 percent, the fastest rate in the survey. Now that the Xserve is out, I expect Apple to grow their marketshare more over time.

That's hilarious. Gartner is usually the punching bug of choice for Mac head who question their reports of X86 market share.

[Psycho_Bunny]

Someday, .NET will probably be pretty cool.

Someday.

But right now it's so screwed up that they actually NEED this: