For Microsoft to Live, MSN and Hotmail Must Die

Before taking the cliched sabbatical to spend more time with his family, Microsoft Senior VP of MSN and Personal Services Group, David Cole said, “Have I lost confidence in MSN’s ability to win?”

If he hasn’t, he needs to get out of management.

Surely Cole and other soon-to-be ex-Microsofties understand that the work product from his tenure is a search engine that’s slightly less popular than the Yellow Pages tucked in your desk drawer.

And don’t even mention Hotmail if you’re playing poker with a clutch of mailserver managers. Many consider the free mail service to be a source of too much mischief from spammers, phishers, competitors and other web ne’er-do-wells.

Under Cole’s leadership, a really bad environment has evolved into… a pretty bad environment.

How ’bout marketing? A current ad for Microsoft Office Outlook Live says it all. For a starter price of only US$42.95 per year, you get to Director of Global Sales and Marketing PR Adam Sohn told Paul Thurrott, “MSN lives in a world where it’s innovate or die.”

True enough.

It’s time to die so that Microsoft… and Windows Live… may live.

Email Battles Backgrounder:

• Craigslist Lockout of Hotmail and Yahoo Enters Month 4; Email Battles; 01 March 2006
• MSN Blockades phpBB Searchers; Email Battles; 18 January 2006
• Gotchas when running Microsoft CRM 3 without Exchange Server; NewsByte; Email Battles; 06 January 2006
• Should Hotmail Be Your Firm’s Mail Server?; Email Battles; 05 December 2005
• Hotmail Infestation Breaks Email (Updated 5 Dec); Email Battles; 08 December 2005
• Caught In The Net: Tale of Two Scammers; Email Battles; 31 August 2005
• How Phishers Turn Guppies Into Worms; Email Battles; 20 June 2005
• Microsoft Breaks Yahoo! webmail; Email Battles; 24 March 2004
• Microsoft Trustworthy Effort Fails Hotmail; Email Battles; 11 February 2004
• HotMail Switches Ignite Spam Blast; Email Battles; 11 February 2004