Wow… this is pretty surprising news. I just learned that MovableType — which powers this blog and likely millions of others — is in final talks with Microsoft!
Without a hardcore blogging tool to call its own, Microsoft made its usual decision to buy rather than build, giving it near-instant access to the latest craze — blogging. This positions Microsoft squarely against Google (with Blogger) and AOL (with AOL Journals), and will allow it to more efficiently glean and index content for its new search engine.
As a side benefit, Microsoft will be able to keep the same abbreviation — “MT” — though will understandably rebrand the tool “MicrosoftType” by its expected launch date in mid-to-late-July.
Though no press release has been made at this point (at least that I’m aware of!), I have heard this first hand from two of my Microsoft employee friends, and I expect more news to be leaked, er, made public within the next 24 hours 🙂
Remember, you read it here first on BLADAM!
NOTE: The note above was posted on April Fools Day! For the humor-impaired, this means it was meant in a spirit of goofy fun… and specifically, MovableType is not, in any way, being bought out by Microsoft!
What do you think?