A comparative release

Windows Live is to Windows as Xbox Live is to Xbox. You can't have Windows Live without Windows - but you can have Windows without Windows Live. This is Microsoft showing that it has a presence on all the layers of the next generation computing stack. It's a logical move - and nothing to do with Microsoft's rivalry with Google. The MSN brand needs reworking - and bringing elements of it closer to the Windows platform makes a lot of sense, especially with the Vista wave of tools pushing Microsoft's XAML-powered Smart Client vision. I wonder how much the live.com domain cost the folk at Redmond?