Microsoft's search team posted a screen shot of a redesigned search site, called Kumo, on its blog last week. A leaked memo from the team's technical leader, Satya Nadella, described Kumo.com as a test program that can only be accessed from computers on Microsoft's network. The company confirmed the memo's authenticity after it appeared on Cnet News.
Online dictionaries reveal kumo to mean "spider" or "cloud" in Japanese (but it is also the Swedish word for a Finnish town). Kumo.com, as depicted in the screen shot, offers few hints as to the definition Microsoft has in mind.
The Kumo logo, which Microsoft has not confirmed as its final choice, is blue, lowercase and not immediately recognizable as a Microsoft brand. The screen-shot version does provide links to MSN and Windows Live, though.
Kumo appears to set itself apart from today's Live Search by giving Web surfers clearer clues about the kinds of results that exist. A search for a country music star yields results separated into such categories as Web, songs, lyrics, music and biography. Buttons on the left let users quickly pick just one of those categories to peruse.
Microsoft has struggled for years to compete with Google Inc., the leader in Web search traffic and related advertising revenue. Despite its best efforts, which include a failed attempt to buy No. 2 Yahoo Inc. and to engineer an improved search site of its own, Microsoft has remained firmly stuck in third place.
Matt Rosoff, an analyst for the independent research group Directions on Microsoft, said Kumo is a better name than Live.
"I think Live meant too many things," he said. "At least Kumo is weird."
He also pointed out that the Web address for Live Search was a matter of confusion for many users. While some knew to go to live.com, others would type windowslive.com or go to the MSN home page. Microsoft doesn't own the livesearch.com address, and typing live.search.com instead of search.live.com takes you to another non-Microsoft site.
But there's not enough in a name to get Microsoft out of its search pit, Rosoff said.
"It's necessary, but not sufficient," Rosoff said, adding that the softwaremaker must also come up with an interface that is significantly different from Google.
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