Microsoft will be buying position for its Live Search on HP notebooks in 2009. Whoohooo. More “extras” in your next computer. I’m kind of surprised Toshiba didn’t make this announcement too, since they are one of the kings of crapware.
What’s interesting about this is which markets the Live team thinks they will be reaching here. It’s not going to be tech savvy students. For self-purchased machines, they’re sure to switch the settings and remove the extraneous toolbar. And for schoolwide purchased systems, they are sure to wipe out the system and install their own “builds.”
Maybe on the small business side, people will leave Live Search enabled, but where the greatest numbers of Live Search users will be, will come from people who are too lazy to make a change or don’t know how to do so. This sounds so AOL like.
I can’t say it’s a terrible way of getting Live Search out to people, but at this point I don’t think Live Search is compelling enough to make the switch to most. Sorry. It’s close, but not there. Were Live Search to be better, for students, for small business owners, then I’d be all over this. But it’s not. Not yet.