Microsoft folds-in Multimap for ‘$50m’ | The Register
This one both confuses me, and makes sense. It confuses me, because Microsoft are saying buying Multimap will somehow make their offering better. I’m not sure how, as the Live maps interface is actually very slick. It’s fast, easy to use, and I just like it! I used to use Google Maps a lot, but the Live maps are far better now, as far as I’m concerned. I stopped using Multimap long ago, as it was so slow and clunky it was unbearable. In this age of Web 2.0, it felt more like Web 0.1 Beta.
It makes sense to me because Microsoft apparently aren’t pulling many people into Live maps. Fair enough I suppose, many people are saying they’re basically buying Multimap’s customers, which by Microsoft’s standards is pretty much usual fare.
So what do I reckon will happen? As a guess, I think MS will start redirecting users to their own live maps after a while. They’ll probably also move some of the map data across, and start using that, and some of the search technology probably, but otherwise it’ll spell the end of Multimap as we know it.