Windows Strata Disappears in the Cloud

Well, it was there yesterday, with eight sessions attached it. Did somebody post the name by mistake? Is Microsoft teasing bloggers, journalists and company enthusiasts? Does anybody even care?

Answers will come the last week of October, just in time for Halloween, when Microsoft is supposed to scare the bejeebees out of everybody with its new services operating system/platform(s).

Maybe Amazon is scared already. The big retailer is cutting pricing on its S3—that's Simple Storage Service to you, bud. On Nov. 1, the one price fits all—that's 15 cents per month for each terabyte of storage used—gives way to a four-tier scale. The more you store, the less you pay. The repricing is ballsy, ahead of any SQL Server Data Service pricing Microsoft might or might not announce later this month. SQL Server 2008 is released, so surely Microsoft's storage service has got to come out of beta sometime.

Whatever Windows Strata may or may not be, there's one big integrated services thingy coming from Microsoft later this month. Amazon should squirm a little.

As for Strata, I'm wondering what that name really means, not that it has gone for the PDC Website. Domains Windowsstrata.com and Windowstrata.com were registered and parked yesterday, presumably for domain speculation. Surely, if Windows Strata were anything more than a codename, Microsoft would have snapped up the domains already.

[Please send your tips or rumors to watchtips at live.com.]