The rumor has it Microsoft is pondering a search engine name change. Does Kumo sound better than Live to you?

Pandia has repeatedly argued that Microsoft’s search engine branding strategy has been a disaster.

MSN Search was not exactly poetic, but people did at least know MSN.

Then it became Windows Live Search, although the search engine didn’t have much to do with the operating system per se and the name was therefore utterly confusing. It finally ended up as Live Search.

Live Search isn’t exactly a bad brand, but it has failed to connect with the general public. This is, we believe, one reason Microsoft tried so hard to get hold of Yahoo. Yahoo! remains a strong search brand.

In August Mary Jo Foley of ZD Net wrote that Microsoft was testing three possible names, namely Hook, Bing and Kumo. Kumo either means “spider” in Japanese, cf. the old Lycos search engine, or — alternatively — “cloud”, which makes sense in this age of “cloud computing”.

LiveSide.net now reports that control of the Kumo.com domain has been moved from a registrar to Microsoft, and is now pointing to an internal Microsoft test site.

If this truly is a move towards renaming the search service, does this mean that Microsoft has given up on acquiring Yahoo?

Maybe or maybe not. Kumo.com can be a ruse to put a pressure on Yahoo! “Look here,” Microsoft may say. “We no longer want the Yahoo! brand. We are doing this on our own.” In short: If you want us to rescue you, you’d better give us a good bargain.

Microsoft has also indicated that they are more interested in the Yahoo! search engine, rather than the whole of Yahoo! (including content sites, email services etc.). However, if they buy the search engine and not the company, they are not likely to get the Yahoo! brand, which means that a new name for the “new” Live/Yahoo! search engine could make sense.

By choosing Kumo, Microsoft will go down the same road as Yahoo! and Google, namely finding a word that does not immediately signal what the service is about. That might be a good idea.

Whether Kumo is a good candidate may be debated. Marketing Pilgrim hates it: “I hope Microsoft realizes that at this point in time, Kumo inspires nothing in us. Four letters does not a great search engine make!”

It is easy to pronounce and remember, however, and helps people distinguish the search engine from the vaguely defined “Live” concept. It sounds more contemporary and youthful and may distinguish this service from the more drab and business-like appearance of so many of Microsoft’s online services.

But if they do decide to re-brand the search engine, they’d better stick to the new name. They have already diluted brand recognition to the extreme. That service can hardly survive yet another change.