WebFives "Free" Photo Site - Get your stuff off in 30 Days!

| | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)
This will never happen on iForem

Ah, Microsoft. Always late to the game. Maybe it's a part of their strategy: wait until Google (Picasa Web Albums) and Yahoo (Flickr) establish solid market positions, and then develop or buy an (usually inferior) product of their own and try to corner those remaining 10% of users.

This time, they've acquired WebFives (previously Vizrea), a photo/video/audio sharing site primarily aimed at mobiles, specifically Nokia devices. In typical Microsoft fashion, they're promptly shutting down the service (current users have 30 days to download their content) which will probably reemerge later as a Microsoft branded product.

Here's an excerpt from the letter that Mike Toutonghi had recently sent to all Webfives users:

"In November of 2007, we reached an agreement with Microsoft, wherein Microsoft has acquired all rights to WebFives technology, patents pending, trademarks, and software to incorporate into its products and services over time. In order to make our wind down process as easy as possible for our users, Microsoft has agreed to provide us with a license to continue operating WebFives until the end of the year, giving you time to copy any information you would like to keep to your own PCs or another service prior to the end of the year."

Just what the users wanted to hear, I guess.

Categories

0 TrackBacks

Listed below are links to blogs that reference this entry: WebFives "Free" Photo Site - Get your stuff off in 30 Days!.

TrackBack URL for this entry: http://blog.iforem.com/blog/mt-tb.cgi/57

Leave a comment

About this Entry

This page contains a single entry by Stephen Pieraldi published on December 1, 2007 4:56 PM.

Documents Potentially Subject to Preservation Obligations was the previous entry in this blog.

Free Online Services: The Dark Side is the next entry in this blog.

Find recent content on the main index or look in the archives to find all content.