NI-Limits Blog

PopFly properly launches Microsoft’s Silverlight with Style!

Microsoft just launched a new service and domain, and it is perhaps one of their most intriguing moves this year, for it brings-up several matters of fact that strike us as interesting. Popfly.ms allows users to create powerful mashups and sexy widgets using friendly online GUIs. Think Yahoo Pipes and Blidgets or Spring Widgets express, but on super strong steroids.

TechCrunch had this to say:

Microsoft will announce the private beta launch of Popfly this morning, a new Silverlight application that allows users to create mashups, widgets and other applications using a very cool and easy to use web-based graphical interface. We previously covered the launch of Yahoo Pipes and compared five different applications that let you mix data and build applications online. At the time we mentioned how this space was really heating up - and how Pipes from Yahoo simplified the creation of mashups and mini-applications by providing a drag+drop interface. Microsoft are the latest entrants in this market, and they have completely leapfrogged every other application we have seen so far.

Popfly is a big leap forward from the competitors above because it lets you do so much more, and it is one of the nicest web application interfaces I have ever seen. With Popfly, you can create applications, mashups, web pages and widgets (gadgets) and it is all tied together in a social network (as part of the Live Spaces platform) where you can connect with other users and publishers of applications. Mashups are created by dragging in and connecting ‘blocks’ which produce an output. Blocks are modules that connect to various web services API’s, and even today there are dozens of different blocks that work with a whole variety of different web services.

However, beyond that, one of the more interesting points regarding this launch was that it showed Microsoft getting funky with their domain names and the fact that this is registered under an MS extension. Our first thoughts were that Microsoft had secured the TLD from iCANN all for themselves, which although was not the case, we are certain that it soon will.

MS domain extensions are for country of Montserrat and cost close to RM 750 for two years, and as Domain Tools points out, this is the sign of something new, and certainly gets you thinking.

The domain did not show any signs Microsoft owned it until today. We checked the Whois History and yesterday it was registered to William McCarthy from Emeryville California and has since he first registered it in May of 2000. Not even the name servers changed until today. This shows that Microsoft is very aware they should not leak secrets via DNS. A lot of Public companies still do not realize every DNS change they make is logged by us. We use Name Server Spy to watch every domain that touches Microsoft’s DNS server so perhaps they are aware people watch them. A lot of companies still haven’t figure this out yet, so do us a favor, don’t let them know .

This is one of the first times Microsoft picked a product name that doesn’t sound so corporate. It is still a bad name, but at least it is easy short and catchy. Just go to PopFly.com. Microsoft didn’t register this domain new, they bought it from the owner. This also shows the after-market is live and well but they didn’t buy the domain from an after-market site, they bought it from the owner. Most sales in the after-market are direct sales.

We have of course signed-up for a beta test account and will post our findings as soon as we have had the chance to fiddle with this incredible looking program. Maybe Silverlight is worth keeping our eyes on after-all…?

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