MS says "The Spoke" not competitor for Blogger

As a follow-up to our story on TheSpoke, Microsoft is still not saying much officially about the MS-owned blogging site. In an article in the Australian online edition of PCWorld, a MS spokesman did say a little about what TheSpoke was all about:

Microsoft's academic developer initiative is focused on building a community of students interested in software development, the Microsoft spokesman said. TheSpoke is in a test phase and more features will be added, he said, adding that the site is not intended to be competition for blogging services such as Google Inc.'s Blogger.

Nope, I'm sure it isn't intended to compete with Blogger, at least not at this stage. However, anyone familiar with the way Microsoft competes will recognize how it tests the waters when it decides to get into something potentially profitable. Just ask Netscape.