Here is a memo just put out by Microsoft SVP Satya Nadella about big management changes at MSN, obtained by BoomTown.

Current MSN head Erik Jorgensen will move over full-time to focus on mobile efforts, and his replacement will be Ted Cahall, who most recently headed tech efforts at AOL (AOL).

In another move, Marc Davis has joined Microsoft as Partner Architect to the Online Services Division, working for Nadella on strategy. He comes from a stint as chief scientist at Invention Arts and before that worked at the MIT Media Lab, Interval Research, UC Berkeley, and Yahoo (YHOO).

But why listen to BoomTown yammer on–here’s the internal memo from Microsoft (MSFT):

From: Satya Nadella
Sent: Tuesday, August 17, 2010 1:26 PM
To: XXX
Cc: XXX
Subject: OSD R&D Leadership Announcement

I wanted to share some changes we are making in OSD R&D team to better align and focus our leadership on key priorities across MSN and Mobile.

As you know, mobile is a top priority for OSD. Over the past year, it’s become increasingly clear that driving innovation in mobile presents an opportunity to rethink search. Specifically, we have an opportunity to build mobile search into an indispensible service for completing tasks and making decisions by weaving in geo-spatial & personal context.

To capitalize on the mobile opportunity we need to deliver innovation that consumers love and is competitively differentiated. To this end, I have asked Erik Jorgensen to focus fully on this opportunity. Erik will continue to drive our product strategy and execution across mobile devices, as well as building the cutting-edge location & mapping services.

Erik’s leadership across the MSN and mobile businesses over the past few years has been invaluable to the team. Asking him to double-down and focus on mobile and mapping is the right thing for our business, and I want to thank him for his leadership in the past, and for all the contributions he will make driving our mobile and location-based services efforts forward.

We have built strong momentum on MSN, and fully expect this to continue. MSN is a critical part of our online strategy, creating personally and socially relevant content experiences that drive massive amounts of traffic to Bing while maintaining a successful display advertising business. Over the past year the team has done great work–releasing a new homepage with a new design and feature set that is resonating with customers. MSN has also delivered new video experiences across Bing and MSN, Content Studio, a rich social platform, and UCP migration in all international markets. In addition, the team has driven innovative content partnerships in 46 countries, which give MSN a differentiated set of services to offer to our customers and keep our audience growing and engaged.

I am very excited to announce that Ted Cahall will join Microsoft as Corporate Vice President, MSN, reporting to me. It’s critically important to keep our MSN momentum going, and getting Ted is a big win for us. Ted brings a strong command of technical, operational and business details from his years of experience in the online world, including senior leadership roles at AOL, United Online, Bank of America and CNET Networks. Ted will move out here to Seattle, and will start on September 7th. Erik will be working closely with Ted and the MSN leadership team over the coming month to make this a smooth transition.

The MSN leadership team of Scott Moore, Geoff Sutton, John Skovron, Anil Mehra and Erik Zigman, will report to Ted and continue the great work and momentum we have seen in MSN over the past year.

This is exciting news for OSD. With our increasing investments in mobile and location-based services and our great momentum with MSN, putting such strong leaders against our biggest challenges will enable deeper focus on the things that will drive our business forward.

After BoomTown complained at December’s search summit held by Bing about the lack of the finest pastry known to man–namely, donuts!–minions were dispatched by top Microsoft geek general Satya Nadella to fix the dire situation.

And, happily, at Search Summit 2010, there on the lovely snack table were a small pile of them–which looked like Krispy Kreme to me.

There were lacking the key sprinkles feature, but carb crisis averted!

Speaking of features, top Bing execs were on hand in San Francisco to show off all the work they have been doing over the last year in the software giant’s efforts to topple mean old Google (GOOG) via an innovative offering.

Even the plain-speaking Nadella acknowledged in his opening it was still a bit of a children’s crusade, since Bing had barely broken into double digits in search market share and Google was hovering around 70 percent.

But the most recent report released this week by comScore (SCOR) showed continued promise, so Microsoft (MSFT) presses on its long and pricey road!

Here’s my liveblog of this morning’s event at the software giant’s San Francisco office:

10 am PT: Nadella opened with the donuts news. Nice move.

Then, it was onto some promising stats of growth, which have surely been promising, despite the high price tag (Microsoft’s online division lost $700 million in the last quarter, to give you an idea of the sticker shock).

Still, as search exec Brian MacDonald said, as he was presenting all the many new features–such as cards–added over the last year: “We’re in it to win it.”

At the end of his presentation, in a slide title “Future,” he said reporters could not take pictures or video. Sure, hop us up on sugar and then tell us something interesting and bar us from taking snaps!

But MacDonald clicked through the images so fast, it was hard to tell what Bing would be up to. Essentially, it looks like a more blocky, image-heavy design, with more differing fonts and contextual info.

10:40 am PT: A smart search geek Harry Shum was then on with a lecture about search intent and all kinds of insider tweakery that made me confused, since I do not understand terms such as “page-level dialog.” There is also apparently “session-level dialog.”

Harry knows what it all means, which is pretty much all that counts.

My take: It has to do with some sort of digital conversation Bing search dudes are having with the users that users have no idea is actually going on.

Simply put: They’re watching you.

11 am PT: Next search guy talked about search intent and such.

That means adding features such as a link to search history or instant weather on the opening page. It’s the little touches that count.

In fact, they do, as Bing tries to differentiate itself from what Google offers, via a series of neat tricks and clever design.

That includes, for example, easy access to lyrics and song classifiers, when searching in music.

Lady Gaga’s “Poker Face” was used as an example, since Lady Gaga seems to be the go-to gal on seeming cool these days.

(But is it time to check Bing search trends to see if she is peaked?)

11:19 am: Next, top Online Services Division exec Erik Jorgensen came on to discuss mobile and mapping. He compared himself with “Edward Scissorhands” when talking about how hard it is to have a good experience on a small device.

“Type less, do more,” is the internal mantra at Bing, he said. Coincidentally, my mantra is type more, do less.

Jorgensen showed off Bing mobile stats: 23 million users, 160 percent growth and four million downloads of its iPhone app. Yes, it has come to this–Microsoft using Apple (AAPL) to tout its success.

Then it was onto mapping, which is a pretty good arena for Bing. Stats: 41 percent growth in U.S. unique users, 43 percent rise in searches using enhanced maps, a huge boost in map apps.

11:29 am: Bing Maps guru Blaise Aguera y Arcas–who has the single most sexy name in all of geekdom–said the focus is now on social location.

As in Foursquare!

In fact, he showed off a map in which Foursquare check-ins pour in and pop up in a bit of a freaky way, as in: You can stalk in real-time.

Then it was onto cool mapping eye-candy, which I always fall for since the whole zoom-in-zoom-out thing is mesmerizing. Aguera y Arcas showed off clickable geographic names and embedded maps within maps from, in this case, a zoo or a museum.

11:50 am: Q&A Time!

The first question is about gaming. It’s hot said Nadella, and Bing wants to provide discovery and search more than games themselves.

I asked a question about the status of the Yahoo (YHOO) search partnership deal, which is in process. It is a very complex process, in fact.

And, though they were supposed to be in tandem, Nadella said that algorithm would move faster than advertising technology handover.

“If there were a drop of of advertisers [due to the new deal], that would be problematic,” he said.

Yes, which segued into the next obvious topic: When would Bing make some dough?

Thus. I asked about the high costs of competing in the search space, which Nadella said would continue, including distribution deals and in the aggressive marketing of Bing.

“For sure, we had to ante up,” he said. “But the product has to be able to stand on its own…ultimately, the product has to carry the day.”

More questions about distribution, social search, churn, product differentiation and whether Bing is growing from a more passive user to building a “fan base.”

BoomTown brainstorm: If they handed out delicious donuts with each search, I’d leave Google in a New York minute.

But, like a skunk at a garden party, I asked another question about when Bing is going to break even.

Nadella was too smart to answer this digital hot potato.

“It’s a big market where money can we made, and we are making progress,” he said, saying I should ask his bosses about specifics.

I shall!

In this vein, someone then asked a question about whether Bing would ever become a verb as Google has become.

Shum joked that in the future six letters would be too many for people to say, so things were looking up for four-letter search brands!

More questions included whether Google was tweaked by Bing yet (yep!), and whether Bing should try to win in an international market to show some muscle (U.S. is still top focus).

Finally, it was “time to deploy the cream puffs,” said a Microsoft PR honcho.

Long past time, I’d say.

MSN, which launched a beta version of a radical new homepage design in November, is releasing it to all its 100 million monthly U.S. customers within the next two weeks.

The wide rollout by the Microsoft (MSFT) portal will include its most significant online marketing program yet on sites such as the Hulu video and Pandora radio services–although it won’t cost nearly as much as the $100 million the tech giant is spending to hawk its Bing search service.

While the new MSN homepage is not radically different than the preview version Microsoft has been testing on 10 percent (and, more recently, 25 percent) of its user base, after consumer and testing feedback, it includes: A larger search box; more local features, such as hyperlocal Twitter feeds; and more multimedia content, including in-line videos.

“We have gotten a lot of great response to the new site, so we think everyone should be using it,” said Scott Moore, MSN’s U.S. executive producer. “We’re particularly encouraged about how usage of light and medium users has grown.”

Presumably that’s because the new MSN homepage has been drastically simplified, with a white, cleaner look that calls to mind the design ethos of Apple (AAPL).

I suppose if you can’t beat them…

The launch was the first major upgrade of the MSN main page in a decade, part of an overhaul the software giant has been doing throughout its money-losing online services division to spur innovation.

That includes the launch of Bing last May, which has been a relative success for Microsoft, adding a small amount of search market share and, more important, some much needed respect to its long-beleaguered consumer Web efforts.

Whether putting the new MSN in front of all its consumer will work or not remains an open question. Together, MSN and Windows Live have about 100 million unique monthly visitors, putting Microsoft typically third behind Google (GOOG) and Yahoo (YHOO).

Here’s the official blog post from Microsoft, as well as more videos that you want to see of MSN senior execs in Microsoft-made interviews about the changes:

New MSN Homepage offers search, news, local and social networking–all in one place

Today is an exciting milestone for MSN. We are beginning the launch of our new homepage to our customers in the US. The new MSN homepage offers search, news, local and social networking–all in one place. We encourage you to try the new homepage today and learn more about the many cool features.

Since the preview of our new homepage began in November, we’ve been very busy gathering over 70,000 pieces of customer feedback and introducing over 30 updates in our quest to deliver the best homepage to stay in the know.

Here are a few things we learned and new features we introduced to address customer feedback:

Bing, Bing, and more Bing. We’ve seen double-digit increases in Bing search queries coming from the new homepage. People wanted even more Bing, so we:

· Increased the prominence of the Bing search box to make it easy for you to search from the MSN homepage.

· Added a new TrendWatch feature to highlight the day’s top movers on Twitter.

· Increased the prominence of Popular Searches, where our editorial team highlights the most interesting and topical searches of the day.

· Increased editorial programming of search-related content, including videos and images.

· And, we’re currently testing a Search History feature so you can more easily find information you typically search for.

Local is a home-run. We knew people craved local information, but we’ve been surprised by how quickly our local offering has taken off. The MSN Local module on the homepage is driving over 50% more traffic to our new local offering, MSN Local Edition. This site already has over 9 million unique users every month, making it the #4 online newspaper in terms of unique users, and the leader for page views. MSN Local Edition, which uniquely covers the entire country across 42,000 zip codes, continues to innovate, introducing new features like:

· Hyper-local Tweets, which uses the power of Bing to highlight tweets from your location

· My Cities lets you personalize MSN Local and save up to 3 cities to follow–making it easy to keep up with your friends or family across the entire country.

· With partnerships with NBC Local Media and Hearst Television, MSN Local Edition now offers 3,000 news video clips a week across 36 local markets.

You love images and news. The main module on the new homepage, which features a prominent image, receives over 50% more clicks than our original homepage. We’re continuing to offer more multi-media on the new homepage–including launching the availability of in-line HD video today. Now you can watch HD video in-line on the MSN homepage with minimal buffering. We also learned:

· The design of the new page was largely positively received, but we heard from some MSN loyalists that they missed our traditional blue background. So, we tested many different versions of our design–including an entirely blue background–and it turns out most people prefer the clean, white background we introduced with the preview–with a touch of blue highlighting the top of the page.

· The tabs on the new homepage allow us to highlight different categories of news and many different headlines with less clutter–we learned you love lots of news headlines to choose from, so we added more tabs and made the navigation easier so you can easily access the wealth of information on MSN.

· Social networking is handy to have on the homepage. Most of you appreciate the all-in-one offering of the new MSN homepage–including the ability to check your Hotmail, Messenger and favorite social networks, like Facebook and Twitter, right from your MSN homepage. We realized we could make social networking even easier, so now our social network module defaults to the social network tab you use most frequently (Facebook, for example).

These are just a few of the many themes we learned and have been working on over the last few months.

Because we want to ensure every customer has a great first experience, we’re taking our time to roll it out, but all of our 100 million customers in the US will have the new homepage within the next few weeks. Today marks an important milestone for us, but we’re going to keep working hard to hear your feedback and deliver more great experiences across MSN.

Bob Visse (general manager, MSN Product Management Group):

Cyrus Krohn (director of online services programming, MSN):

Erik Jorgensen (corporate vice president, MSN):

Scott Moore (U.S. executive producer, MSN):

Earlier today, BoomTown posted about a visit this morning from a passel of top Microsoft search execs rolling into downtown San Francisco to show off even more new features for Bing.

I am here, but the donuts are not. Um, Google always has organic donuts!

In any case, the lineup included: Satya Nadella, SVP for research and development for the Online Services Division; Harry Shum, a corporate VP who is leading core search development; and Brian MacDonald, corporate VP for Core Search Program Management.

As I previously wrote:

“The rolling-stone-gathers-no-moss team at the software giant–which has been seeing some promising progress in its quest to raise its search market share with its snappy new service–has announced an ongoing series of features since Bing was launched earlier this year.”

It’s 10:07 am PT and I await new wisdom from Microsoft (MSFT).

10:10 am: Nadella, the point man on Bing technology, begins.

He kicks off the show with some stats and a main point: Microsoft’s search share has, as his first slide reads: “Still a long way to go.”

At 9.9 percent versus Google’s (GOOG) share of more than 70 percent, Nadella is correct. But that is up from eight percent in a short time, so not bad.

Unique monthly visitors are also up from 71.7 million to 83.3 million. And perception, which was low, is now 48 percent.

In other words, more consumers seem to know what Bing is.

Personally, if I were Microsoft, I would declare victory and quit now!

10:19 am: A demo dude arrives to show “task” pages, which cluster around intent of searchers.

These are cool, and he’s showing a John Mayer page, which includes concerts and more. I hate that whiny singing dude, demo dude. He was mean to Jennifer Aniston, so he is dead to me.

Phew, the demo dude moves on to Miami. I love Miami. Trying to gauge intent, there is a slideshow available, better weather (rainy but 82 degrees!) and flight info. Plus no John Mayer!

Next, demo dude does movies. He shows times for the freaky “Paranormal Activity” and then offers hi-def trailers. Demo dude’s wife wants him to see it. I advise against it, unless he wants to be looking under the bed for the rest of his life.

Now the cheeky Softies, showing off how good Bing’s info is about Apple, (AAPL); display financial info and even the customer service number. I contemplate ordering a Mac.

This is followed by moves through universities and diseases (with related drug cards).

10:30 am: The demo dude moves on to an early look-see of Bing’s its upcoming Facebook deployment, using its already-announced Visual Search.

It’s apparently going to be very easy to be a stalker on Bing!

On to Twitter, with access to tweets in a variety of ways, from the most tweeted to most popular. Ashton Kutcher pops up like an inevitable Twitter weed, of course.

Nadella comes back and explains that this is being done to “browse to your intent.”

And now it is time for a mobile search update.

Guess what? Intent and search completion in a mobile context is time-sensitive! Who knew?

Actually, I did know and so did the whole world. Here is my typical mobile search: “Where the *&%# is that restaurant/kid party/gas station?”

10:38 am: A new demo dude (let’s call him demo dude #2) is showing off the recent mobile app for Bing, which came out a few weeks ago.

Lots of maps, although he says, “it’s more than just finding something on a map.”

Demo dude #2 types a “T,” which stands for AT&T, and stock info pops up.

He talks into the phone now for weather in Redmond, Wash., where Microsoft has its HQ. Cold and rainy! Which is a shocker for the Seattle area this time of year.

Demo dude #2 does movies and sports, showing a lot of what is on the Web. This is not much different than many mobile apps, but it works nicely.

Nadella seems to be promising an iPhone app soon too, noting that Microsoft will have them for all platforms, but he does not say it outright.

10:47 am: Now, Nadella is onto spatial search, which I like to call “oooh-that’s-pretty search.”

Therefore, we need a third demo dude. Demo dude #3 has a beard!

But he has a real new feature! A new mapping technology, powered by Microsoft’s Silverlight video technology, in beta within minutes. You can see it in action here.

It includes a Google competitor that has been called “streetside” before, with several new twists, which demo dude #3 is calling a “mash-in” (compared to a mashup, which is done a lot with Google by third-party folks).

The demo appears very seamless in comparison, using 3-D modeling and photorealism by integrating its Photosynth research work.

He shows a cool look at a museum and then the French American International School in San Francisco.

In this demo, demo dude #3 was looking at restaurants, which shows reviews and also the whole scene around it, including info on the parking garage you can see.

There is now a Map App gallery, most of which made by Microsoft right now.

11:07 am: A Twitter dude is brought up to show how the microblogger is part of this new mapping stuff from Microsoft, which he calls an “ecosystem.”

Using new geolocating tools on the microblogging service, it shows all kinds of geospatial information of tweets.

Twitter recently signed a data-mining deal with Microsoft, as well as Google.

So, it looks like Microsoft and Google are really going to be duking it out in the online mapping of everyone’s lives. And I look forward to this fight and the eventuality that they will want to map my every move. Bing it on!

11:10 am: Nadella wraps up, essentially trying to keep differentiating Bing from Google.

“We do hundreds of experiments a day,” he says, releasing as many features as possible.

It’s a good stance for a lesser competitor to have: Bing, We Try Harder!

Big words for Microsoft: Intent versus query. Whole page versus blue links. Minimizing time versus task completing. Search hit-or-miss versus dialog.

11:16 am: Q&A!

A question about human versus technology in perfecting this intent goal.

MacDonald and Nadella note that humans are important, but Bing is built around the big computing systems that do this automatically.

Will the structured page be indexable? Meaning Google? No real answer! But I would love to see Microsoft go all Rupert Murdoch on the search giant!

Then comes a question about premium or “non-Google” content. Nadella avoids the question and instead focuses on the “scaffolding” the data.

“We’re not as focused on getting exclusive content,” he says flatly. Uh-oh, publishers! As I reported, Microsoft is not forking over the dough.

MacDonald also tries to stress that Google wants folks off its site and onto the query result and that Bing is focusing on delivering that result right.

Everything is not a command line, declares MacDonald.

On a question of openness and the need to use Microsoft Silverlight technology for some of the rich visual mapping, versus Ajax, Nadella points out the service is too small not to be. Good point!

But Microsoft execs, who often shove their tech right down consumers’ throats, are nearly apologetic about having to use Silverlight (except they add, of course, that it is better!).

Nadella gets another question about paying to de-index Google.

“There is no real intent here that is focused on getting a whole bunch of content that is de-indexed from Google,” he said.

Some more questions about Bing monetization (it had better make money!) and global share.

Since Google is cleaning the clocks of everyone even worse abroad, Bing is focusing on the U.S.

I ask about how the Yahoo (YHOO) deal is going. “Well!”

And while Yahoo seems to be losing some search share to Microsoft, Nadella said his company would provide any “core” technology Yahoo wants to use given that Microsoft will be providing the search platform.

It would have been nice if Yahoo search had done this itself, of course, but Nadella said Yahoo could use the mapping and even task pages.

This morning, a passel of top Microsoft search execs is rolling into downtown San Francisco to show off even more new features for Bing.

They include: Satya Nadella, SVP for research and development for the Online Services Division; Harry Shum, a corporate VP who is leading core search development; MSN Corporate VP Erik Jorgensen; and Brian MacDonald, corporate VP for Core Search Program Management.

The rolling-stone-gathers-no-moss team at the software giant–which has been seeing some promising progress in its quest to raise its search market share with its snappy new service–has announced an ongoing series of features since Bing was launched earlier this year.

Besides the joy of driving the Google (GOOG) search bigfoots nuts–said one exec at the search giant to me recently in an indignant tone: “You know, we have all those features ready and could add them anytime!”–it’s probably fun to crow about being innovative at Microsoft (MSFT), not exactly the company that would pop to mind when that Silicon Valley prayer word is invoked.

So, what’s next? BoomTown has no idea, but I will be letting you know as soon as I do, via liveblogging the event, which starts at 10 am!

UPDATE: Tom Warren at Neowin.net speculates that the features could include a “Bing Explorer,” which “aims to seamlessly search and browse to find, re-find and discover.” Would that this event were that interesting!

Until then, here is the lovely invite I got from the Softies or Bingies or whatever:

Hi Kara,

You are cordially invited to join us for a Bing news event, Wednesday, December 2 from 10:00-11:00 a.m. at the Microsoft San Francisco offices. Microsoft executives Satya Nadella, Harry Shum, Erik Jorgensen, Brian MacDonald and others will showcase and demo several new Bing features. We will begin promptly at 10 a.m. Please feel free to join us if you can spare the time!

Microsoft San Francisco
835 Market Street
San Francisco, CA 94103

Please let me know if you’re interested in attending. Hope to see you there!

Until he speaks later today, here is a video interview I did with Nadella right after Microsoft struck its search and advertising partnership with Yahoo (YHOO) this summer:

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20091202/bing-keeps-up-the-new-features-rollouts-boomtown-will-liveblog-a-microsoft-showcase-at-10-am/feed/ 10 http://allthingsd.com/20091119/msn-head-greg-nelson-moves-to-microhoo-integration-role-yahoo-picks-morrissey/ http://allthingsd.com/20091119/msn-head-greg-nelson-moves-to-microhoo-integration-role-yahoo-picks-morrissey/#comments Thu, 19 Nov 2009 19:03:37 +0000 Kara Swisher http://kara.allthingsd.com/?p=20820

Greg Nelson (pictured here), who has had the thankless job of running MSN for Microsoft, has left that position and been given the even more thankless task of running the integration of the complex search and online advertising partnership struck by the software giant and Yahoo.

Microsoft (MSFT) sent out an internal email to staff about the move for the GM of MSN’s Global Media Group, which has already taken place.

MSN U.S. head Scott Moore is now reporting directly to MSN Corporate VP Erik Jorgensen. So will Brett Wayn, who has been working under Nelson on international coordination and who has taken over MSN’s international business on an interim basis.

Nelson’s counterpart at Yahoo (YHOO), according to sources, will be Mark Morrissey (pictured here), who is currently SVP of Products at the Internet giant.

The pair will have their hands full in what will ultimately be a two-year effort, sources estimate, to try to improve their competitive edge against Google (GOOG) in the search arena.

BoomTown’s title for the relationship: A Couple of White Geek Guys Sitting Around Arguing!

The role includes coordinating a massive shift of engineering talent from Yahoo to Microsoft, making sure ad systems are copacetic and most of all, smoothing over what is likely to be a number of bumps in the partnership.

To help make the frustrations less frustrating, there is a $50 million annual payment to Yahoo by Microsoft for three years, for unspecified “transition and implementation costs.”

At least 400 Yahoo employees will be hired by Microsoft, which will also provide funds for retention packages to keep 150 more Yahoos motivated during the transition.

The “Definitive Agreement” between the Silicon Valley company and the Redmond, Wash.-based Microsoft, which had been slated to be signed by Oct. 27, 2009, is about to be completed.

Then, as soon as regulatory approvals are in place, it will be showtime for Nelson and Morrissey.

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20091119/msn-head-greg-nelson-moves-to-microhoo-integration-role-yahoo-picks-morrissey/feed/ 2 http://allthingsd.com/20091103/msns-bob-visse-talks-about-homepage-redesign-plus-microsofts-videos-with-designer-and-execs/ http://allthingsd.com/20091103/msns-bob-visse-talks-about-homepage-redesign-plus-microsofts-videos-with-designer-and-execs/#comments Wed, 04 Nov 2009 04:14:38 +0000 Kara Swisher http://kara.allthingsd.com/?p=20203

Here is a video interview BoomTown did with Bob Visse, GM of MSN Product Management today at Microsoft (MSFT) offices in San Francisco.

The new MSN homepage debuts tonight with a redesign cutting clutter, adding the ability to access both top social networking sites Facebook and Twitter, a local focus and with Microsoft’s new Bing search service everywhere.

But, as you can see from the logo above, the MSN butterfly logo remains, although it’s slimmed down too.

(Read all about the details here.)

The launch is the first major upgrade of the MSN main page in a decade, part of an overall rehaul that the software giant has been doing throughout its money-losing online services division.

Here’s Visse talking about the new MSN homepage, as well as two video interviews that Microsoft did with MSN Designer Wende Copfer, as well as MSN Corporate VP Erik Jorgensen, MSN U.S. head Scott Moore and Cyrus Krohn, who leads local programming strategy.

Here are the videos:

MSN’s Bob Visse:

MSN Designer Wende Copfer:

<br/><a href="http://video.msn.com/video.aspx?mkt=en-US&#038;vid=d704362e-d32f-4f8a-a861-65aa1dc33df2" target="_new" title="Designing the new MSN">Video: Designing the new MSN</a>

MSN Execs Erik Jorgensen and Scott Moore:

<br/><a href="http://video.msn.com/video.aspx?mkt=en-US&#038;vid=10bb298e-86b0-4d2f-b475-5087ff06bad0" target="_new" title="New MSN Homepage is unveiled">Video: New MSN Homepage is unveiled</a>

MSN’s Local Lead Cyrus Krohn:

<br/><a href="http://video.msn.com/video.aspx?mkt=en-US&#038;vid=a9a5dd94-6dff-4aa0-b534-8ad359992990" target="_new" title="Local Edition on MSN">Video: Local Edition on MSN</a>

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20091103/msns-bob-visse-talks-about-homepage-redesign-plus-microsofts-videos-with-designer-and-execs/feed/ 2 http://allthingsd.com/20090717/exclusive-msn-preps-for-major-renovation-focusing-on-five-areas-as-it-does-less-better/ http://allthingsd.com/20090717/exclusive-msn-preps-for-major-renovation-focusing-on-five-areas-as-it-does-less-better/#comments Fri, 17 Jul 2009 22:54:48 +0000 Kara Swisher http://kara.allthingsd.com/?p=15915

The edging-ever-closer-to-consummation deal talks with Yahoo about an online advertising and search partnership and the aggressive marketing of its new Bing search service aren’t the only things going on for Microsoft’s online services business these days.

MSN, Microsoft’s online portal, is also preparing a major redo of what U.S. and, possibly, international consumers will see, as it doubles down on five key content verticals, while cutting back on others.

In a new focus that will start to be apparent in the next month, MSN will heavily add to its News, Sports, Finance, Lifestyle and Entertainment offerings, weaving more data from Bing into the mix.

“It’s a decision to make it so MSN does less better,” said one source close to the situation. “So there will be a focus of attention on a smaller number of categories in which we can be either #1 or #2 in, rather than #4 or #5.”

And despite big traffic, that has been the rank Microsoft (MSFT) has achieved for a lot of its vertical categories. It competes against the dominant Yahoo (YHOO) and also Time Warner (TWX) online unit AOL, as well as a range of independent sites.

The refurbishment is being led by Scott Moore, the former Yahoo media exec who came back to Microsoft earlier this year to help juice its prospects.

That does not mean Microsoft is abandoning noncompetitive arenas, such as tech, though. Instead, its offerings in those verticals will be more automated, less original, using content from many partners, and also will rely on mixing in shopping and data from Bing.

“It is not rip and replace,” said another source. “It is putting a lot of scale where we can compete best and using technology tools to help elsewhere.”

In fact, the idea of linking content properties to search in a push-and-pull manner is a strategy that both AOL and Yahoo have also been honing, especially since their own highly trafficked sites are the prime ways they have grown search, and vice versa, on content.

Bing has taken a very interesting niche approach to search, aiming to provide a richer experience in key verticals, like entertainment and travel, in order to differentiate its offering from search behemoth Google (GOOG).

In an interview with paidContent last month, MSN Corporate VP Erik Jorgensen signaled some of the changes now coming, discussing the cleaning up of its homepage, more tightly integrating Bing and MSN, making it easier to share on social networking sites, focusing content and allowing users to even customize it.

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20090717/exclusive-msn-preps-for-major-renovation-focusing-on-five-areas-as-it-does-less-better/feed/ 1 http://allthingsd.com/20090617/microsoft-ready-to-give-up-on-its-would-be-youtube-too/ http://allthingsd.com/20090617/microsoft-ready-to-give-up-on-its-would-be-youtube-too/#comments Wed, 17 Jun 2009 12:27:11 +0000 Peter Kafka http://mediamemo.allthingsd.com/?p=8259

Microsoft is willing to burn lots of cash as it stubbornly pursues its Internet strategy–it lost a staggering $575 million on its online business in the last quarter alone–but even Redmond has its limits. The company is finally confessing that Soapbox, the would-be YouTube it launched in 2006, is no YouTube. And it doesn’t sound that enthusiastic about keeping it going.

Microsoft (MSFT) Vice President Erik Jorgensen tells CNET that it is already going to scale back the site’s ambitions: Rather than let users upload whatever video they want, Soapbox is limiting user-gen uploads to specific categories it thinks it might be able to sell ads against–entertainment, finance, etc.

And the company is not even promising to keep that option open. “We haven’t decided whether you just continue to support it or whether it is too expensive and out of our focus to do,” Jorgensen tells Ina Fried.

My guess is the latter. Soapbox still exists, but I only know this because Ina says so. A Google search for Soapbox gets you to the main MSN video page. I had to resort to a Bing search to find the Soapbox section.

It’s an amazing turnabout, really. When Google (GOOG) bought YouTube for $1.6 billion in 2006, conventional wisdom was that user-generated video was the future, and that the age of “professional” video content was just about over. Three years later, those still in the Web video business–a pool that is shrinking daily–are doing their best to highlight how much stuff they have from grownup pros.

So treasure videos like this “funny dog” clip while you can.

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20090617/microsoft-ready-to-give-up-on-its-would-be-youtube-too/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20090122/msn-changes-afoot/ http://allthingsd.com/20090122/msn-changes-afoot/#comments Thu, 22 Jan 2009 13:49:33 +0000 Kara Swisher http://kara.allthingsd.com/?p=8827 According to several sources, more restructuring is about to hit Microsoft’s online division, as various departments are moved among and between its top execs, with changes to be announced as early as today.

While BoomTown is still gathering information, it looks like longtime Microsoft exec Yusuf Mehdi (pictured here), who is now in charge of marketing, online audience business development and product management for MSN and the search properties, will get more added to his portfolio, including overall business development for the online properties.

Mehdi, whose current title is SVP of the Online Audience Business, could also eventually get purview over programming for MSN too, said several sources.

Both those business units currently (and somewhat inexplicably) report to Satya Nadella, the SVP who heads engineering for Microsoft’s search, portal and advertising platform group.

Nadella and Mehdi are the two key execs who report to Qi Lu, a former Yahoo tech star who was recently hired as president of Microsoft’s online services group

What that means for MSN’s Corporate VP Erik Jorgensen and the GM of its Global Media Group, Greg Nelson, who report to Nadella, is unclear.

But it appears that the Microsoft (MSFT) online group is essentially being split into two clear parts: Engineering, and business and content operations.

Advertising sales, which had previously been under now-departed Microsoft exec Brian McAndrews, has been moved to Microsoft’s centralized Sales, Marketing and Services Group, led by chief operating officer Kevin Turner.

The changes are interesting, given all the behind-the-scenes talks that are now going on between Microsoft and Yahoo (YHOO) and Time Warner (TWX) online unit AOL over their search and search advertising businesses.

Microsoft has been seeking to take over search for both Yahoo and AOL, with its CEO Steve Ballmer recently in talks with both companies, in order to give it a decent market share in its ongoing quest to compete with Google (GOOG) in search.

Right now, Google dominates that market with an over 70 percent share, while Microsoft has just under 10 percent.

Microsoft is announcing its second-quarter earnings today, and many expect it to also announce layoffs, due to the tough economic environment.

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20090122/msn-changes-afoot/feed/ 1 http://allthingsd.com/20081125/musical-chairs-at-msn-heres-a-partial-scorecard-of-whats-what/ http://allthingsd.com/20081125/musical-chairs-at-msn-heres-a-partial-scorecard-of-whats-what/#comments Tue, 25 Nov 2008 09:13:21 +0000 Kara Swisher http://kara.allthingsd.com/?p=7007

Here’s part of an internal memo BoomTown obtained about some small, but interesting, changes at Microsoft’s MSN unit, sent out by the GM of its Global Media Group, Greg Nelson, which is under the leadership of–well, frankly–a confusing panoply of execs.

Essentially, Nelson now reports to Satya Nadella, SVP of the Search, Platform and Advertising Group (think engineering and search) and Erik Jorgensen, Corporate VP of MSN (think business and other stuff).

In addition and apropos of nothing, Yusuf Mehdi serves as SVP of the Online Audience Business and Brian McAndrews is SVP of the Advertiser & Publisher Group.

Also, there is a Windows Live group that does mail, communications and groups too, and a lot of other digital bosses too numerous to mention.

You can see why I have been haranguing Microsoft (MSFT) CEO Steve Ballmer for a little digital clarity, especially around its consumer digital businesses and brands. But Microsoft–like a lot of tech-born businesses–loves to overdesign!

Ballmer has been searching for an overall head of that business to sort it all out since Kevin Johnson left in July, whose massive duties were divvied up.

While he has looked at a lot of execs from inside and outside the company, I recently posted that Ballmer’s latest quarry is former Yahoo tech star Qi Lu.

Only Ballmer knows for sure, many have told me, keeping his decision-making on the issue close to the vest.

But, as many insiders and outsiders familiar with the business have noted to me, whoever takes that role as its digital guru has some very hard decisions to make in all its arenas, from search to advertising to content.

There has been no share growth in search for Microsoft, for example, where archrival Google (GOOG) dominates, even as there have been billions of dollars of investment in data centers and engineers.

And it will fall to the person Ballmer ultimately selects as digital head to figure out what to do next.

Microsoft’s failed attempt to buy Yahoo (YHOO) was one way of dealing with the many issues Microsoft is facing, as well as its current interest in buying Yahoo’s search business.

In any case, here are some new changes at MSN, in Nelson’s words:

· Network Programming, led by Rob Bennett–This group will prioritize investments against Network priorities, shape audience strategy, set Network standards, and sponsor cross-network initiatives.

· Network Entry Points, led by Steve Cvengros–This group will focus on increasing exposure, distribution and discoverability of assets by optimizing and expanding entry points to the Network.

· Vertical Programming, led by Sandy Henson–This group will create content experiences to deeply engage the audience and grow Network value in vertical areas. All channels will move into this group.

· Monetization and Analytics, led by Dell Wilkinson–This group will focus on improving yield by making MSN easier for advertisers to buy and APS to sell through inventory insights and APS engagement.

· Chief of Staff, Eva Corets–This role is responsible for driving team processes and business rhythm, and assisting with prioritization of network projects and interaction with cross-division and cross-Microsoft teams.

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