Details of Microsoft's New Analytics Tool Leaked 68
hhavensteincw writes "Details of Microsoft's answer to Google's Analytics have leaked online. Screenshots have been posted on the Net of the new "Gatineau" Web analytics tool that Microsoft now says will be available in beta this summer. In a blog post, Microsoft's Ian Thomas also reveals that Microsoft will use Live ID (formerly Microsoft Passport) profiles to get its demographic data."
What the FUCK does this have to do with the topic? (Score:2)
well... (Score:1)
Cancel.
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Re: Not any more: *cancel* (Score:2)
Don't even have to cancel what you never had.
Reasons why this will fail (Score:5, Insightful)
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Sounds a lot like the lines at a Disney World opening to a traveling parking lot Carnival.
However, I would pay good money to see the Carnival freak
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The name sucks.
Considering that this is a leak, I doubt that's the final name.
It uses Microsoft Passport
MS Passport, like it or not, is steadily becoming more common. A /. regular might loathe Passport and avoid it, but Joe Sixpack will sign up so he can get a Hotmail account or join Xbox Live. Not everyone thinks the way you do.
It's from Microsoft.
If I remember correctly, Microsoft makes a certain operating system with 90%+ market share. It's so successful, it's a monopoly.
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Anyways, if you come, bring your canoe.
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No kidding.... who would name their product after a former Jets defensive?
Live ID for demographics (Score:2)
Re:Live ID for demographics (Score:4, Informative)
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Suckers. The same people who click the monkey and refi their home loans to go on vacation. The very knowledge of whether someone is a sucker, or isn't, is extremely valuable. It's almost as good as knowing whether someone's a MySpace user.
End "Leaked" Abuse! (Score:5, Insightful)
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Those things happen.
That's how information accidentally gets leaked all the time.
Honest.
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Calm down ... its not like there isn't a Microsoft product that doesn't leak ...
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Oh thanks for that visual. I think im binded for life.
Nice Graphs.. (Score:5, Funny)
Is it just me... (Score:5, Insightful)
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Coming in 2008:
Microsoft Office Live! Ballmer Vista
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But yeah, they have renamed Messenger a few times.
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FromThe Wikipedia ActiveX article: [wikipedia.org]
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Throwy McChairface.
More data mining, great... (Score:2)
Please tell me they won't monitor your browing habits while you're logged in on Passport. We had enough with Alexa [slashdot.org].
Yep (Score:2)
damn that list is getting huge.
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Gatineau (Score:2)
Why would they name it after a Quebec city [wikipedia.org]? Perhaps the relationship is phonetic, as in "We've got-a-no answers for you!"
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Why would they name it after a Quebec city [wikipedia.org]? Perhaps the relationship is phonetic, as in "We've got-a-no answers for you!"
Interestingly - or perhaps ironically - what is now the city of Gatineau used to be known as Hull. It sits directly across the Ottawa River from, well, Ottawa. The name was changed to something more palatable to the separatist Parti Québecois government. Hull's bars used to close two hours later than their Ottawa counterparts, so it was quite common to hear drunken revellers shouting, "I'll see you in Hull!" Workmates showing up hung-over were often told, "You look like you've been to Hull and back
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Thanks
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Not much innovation. (Score:5, Insightful)
(if they ever did, yes I can see that one coming)
Everything I have seen in the last few years (Aero, Zune, Search) seems more of a copy of other peoples innovation and hard work. Call me naive but thats not what I would call innovation, more like skimming the results of other peoples marketing and work.
I only ask as this article was posted as "MS answer to Google's" and I'm seeing this an awful lot in the last few years....
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No.
Ooooh, someone needs a wank!
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Microsoft thrives on copying other ideas, then trying to use their presence to make their product succeed.
Even Windows, their most successful product, did not appear until after Apple presented their new graphical interface.
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Let's just take Vista... 6 billion in research and development money... and it shows. All exciting features dropped and what they release is essentially a warmed-over Windows XP
It's based on the tool from DeepMatrix (Score:2)
What about Software Analytics (Score:2)
www.softwareanalytics.com ?
I wonder if GOOGLE has looked at s/a.
THEIR stuff is KEWL. It has data-mining up the wazoo, and I wouldn't be surprised if they are the ones whose tool were used for federal stings. It can create deep associations based on banking records and other things, such as flight, phone, purchasing and other information. It was more impressive than scary, but still scary. They might still have available some kick-ass screen shots since I last saw them over 2 years ago..
The whole big point that everyone is missing... (Score:4, Insightful)
(1) IE already "reports" back your search results for any URL you type in without "http://" (and according to some rumors/posts, IE7 does this with ALL URLs to verify the site isnt a phishing site).
(2) With their LiveID information (which can easily be tied to the above mentioned browsing habits via IE - as well as Vista's reporting to home tools), they have a decent amount of information on you to tie to your "browsing habits"
(3) EVERY MS Internet property states in the EULA that they have the right to use ANY content you send/upload/store on their service - and share with their "partners" as well - and sell for that matter.
(4) Combine all of these, and MS isn't doing web analytics in the fashion the term already means. They are simply logging ALL of your (IE) surfing habits, tying that to the identifiable information they already have on file for you (assuming you have a Dead-ID account - and possibly even if you dont - if you've activated/registered their software), and scanning your uploaded/stored/sent documents (emails, stuff on any other MS property) to collect information and then sell it to their advertising "partners".
(5) If it weren't for their EULA, this would not be legal. Of course, who is to say that their EULA is legal anyway? I still want to see that be dragged through court.
Normally web analytics does not include parsing your private information (in emails, posts, ALL surfing habits, etc), and using your (given thinking it would be safe) personally identifiable information (via Live-ID, Vista registration, etc) to provide services to others for the purposes of marketing and/or spamming. Unfortunately, the term still applies as it is a form of web-analytics... just in the worst, privacy violating way.
The real thing that should be debated here is how to prevent this - not whether or not their software/service will be good or not. Frankly, with all the information they are privy to, it is hard to see how even MS could mess this up - so that all is a moot point.
The potential for "private" information being used to (a) profile you, (b) make money off of you (by selling that info to someone else you dont want to have it), and/or (c) spam to you in the most personal way (considering they know far more about "you" via your surfing habits) - that's the scary part that should be discussed here.
At least I think so...
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Yes I know, they say
"I would stress that we get this information anonymously, and there is no use of personally identifiable information, such as name or e-mail address, in the product," Ian Thomas from MS's Digital Advertising Solutions Group wrote.
which means what? That the current plans involved NOT getting the information anonymously? That he is recommending they change that plan? Neat huh? He's not saying that he will be getting the information anonymously - but stressing that he thinks they should.
Of course, then there's a matter of semantics involved in that statement... is he saying that the information aggregated should be unable to specify a particular person - or is he saying that the collecting of such data should
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I forgot to add this to the post...
On /. on July 14th:
"In a just-published Microsoft patent application for an Advertising Services Architecture, which delivers targeted advertising as 'part of the OS.' Microsoft, who once teamed with law enforcement to protect consumers from unwanted advertising, goes on to boast that the invention can 'take steps to verify ad consumption,' be used to block ads from competitors,
-> AND EVEN sneak a peek at 'user document files, user e-mail files, user music files, d
Yeah, ok (Score:2)
Hmmmm (Score:2)
I wouldn't mind testing it though... Who thought we needed another search engine before Google was developed?
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Then maybe you can tell me how to have an Analytics profile that conglomerates all of the data from my subdomains into an 'overall' format (i.e. Not just adding hits/users, but doing the math on unique users to the entire domain)
So far, I've not been able to accomplish this..
Open source analytics (Score:2)
Does anyone know a good free/open solution other than phpMyVisites that will give this kind of analytics/search referrer data?
I