Microsoft had planned for the launch of the color photo tool for Wednesday (8-20-2008) but fell to a glitch like Bido did. Their servers crashed with the rush of traffic but hoped to be back up today or as they put it ("shortly"). It is up now!
One thing I noticed is the CNAME record for Photosynth.com is wrong. If you leave off www. the page does not resolve. You would think the greatest software company in the world would understand how servers and domain names worked….
Well, give them sometime! The reason behind this could simply be because They Just Purchased the domain! According to whois records, Photosynth.com was registered to Photosynthesis Inc. as late as 8-18-2008 with the whois record change to Microsoft Corp 8-20-2008!
Holy Crap!!!! They bought the domain the day of launch or at least finally Got It the day of the launch.
At least they went for the domain BEFORE they launched and was made public world wide, unlike what Google and many other companies do.
My guess Microsoft forked out some big bucks for it Late in negotiation and the reason behind the "late" purchase and change of ownership. I do not think the company wanted to give it up earlier, but Microsoft dug a bit deeper in the pocket and the former owner couldn’t resist.
Used Again
It seems more likely that only the registrant changed at the last minute. We saw this with the transfer of Blizzard’s Diablo3.com. Ownership of the domain occurred just days before the announcement.
There are so many domainers and bloggers out there watching records that I think we’ll see more companies adopt this strategy. When you sign with a large corp it goes way beyond escrow and into lawyers and agreements that cannot be broken without substantial harm to the former domain owner.
Tom Clowes
Or alternatively they had the site and launch ready, and simply delayed until the name was under their conrol..
Damir
Nice post – go Microsoft