27 May 2008

Microsoft Live puts the books away

After last week's announcement of their cashback scheme Microsoft have announced in a recent press release yet more changes to their Live service. No new features this time however, but instead the removal of Live Search Books and Live Search Academic.

Live Search Books, released in 2006 was Microsoft's answer to Google Book Search. Working with libraries, including the British Library, they worked to digitise books and together with Live Search Academic they scanned 750,000 books and indexed 80 million journal articles. Though the services are coming to an end Microsoft has stated that books will be integrated into their normal search results on Live.

As well as removing the individual search platforms this also announces the end of Microsoft's scanning and hosting of texts but the company indicated that they hoped others would continue the work. Satya Nadella stated:

"As we wind down Live Search Books, we are reaching out to participating publishers and libraries. We are encouraging libraries to build on the platform we developed with Kirtas, the Internet Archive, CCS, and others to create digital archives available to library users and search engines."

Coming so soon after the announcement of their cashback scheme this seems to indicate a change in focus at Redmond, rather than combating Google on every front they are focusing their efforts on more commercial gains. By streamlining their service they can begin to work against Google's profits and focus on making them their own, but this battle is far from over.

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