Der Bingle

I find it touching and rather sweet that Microsoft has named its new search engine after a beloved American singer. Bing Crosby is sometimes overlooked by newer generations, but his innovative vocal stylings on such classics as “Swinging on a Star” and “White Christmas” influenced Sinatra and many others, resulting in a cascade of musical influences that have inspired many in the biz, from Bono to Amy Winehouse. Until its introduction of “Bing”, which is quite an impressive piece of software btw, I hadn’t realized that Microsoft possessed such a high level of subtlety and sensitivity to our nation’s formative pop-cultural influences.

I hope they continue in the spirit of this lovely gesture to Der Bingle. Here are some modest suggestions, likewise drawn from the golden age of great crooners. In the spirit of Louie Armstrong, a technology to let you carry all your data with you, accessible from any browser, could be called “Satchmo”. After all, how better than to suggest that “the internet is the computer” is a winning strategy than by honoring the man who sang “That Lucky Old Sun”.

And rather than naming their new gesture based interaction system “Natal”, now that it is tantalizingly close to reality, perhaps they could honor the Chairman of the Board himself and call it “Ole Blue Eyes”. After all, Sinatra gave us such classics as “High Hopes”, “The World is in my Arms” and “I Believe”.

Even Vista might be resurrected and renamed “Dean”, after Dean Martin, the great mid-century vocalist who gave us such classics as “You’re Breaking my Heart”, “Just One More Chance” and “Have a Little Sympathy”. And for distributed computing over the internet, why not rebrand the rather overworked phrase “Cloud Computing” in a way that would truly set Microsoft apart from certain highly touted competitors? They could call it “The Velvet Fog”, in honor of Mel Tormé. On the other hand, Mr. Tormé was known for singing “Cast your Fate to the Wind” and “Perfidia”, so that might not really be sending the right message.

But one could argue that naming too many product offerings after singers now long dead is a risky value proposition. Memories are short, and Microsoft is already taking a substantial risk with its brave new product title, given that Bing Crosby passed from this mortal coil in 1977 – long before many of today’s users of internet search were even born. So I would suggest that the company hedge its bets, by including at least one pop singer who is not long dead, but merely, say, freshly dead. Along those lines, perhaps they could introduce a utility that blocks unwanted ads from showing up on your desktop. It would be called, of course, “The King of Pop”.