A few weeks ago “I talked”:http://www.momathome.com/viewfromhome/software_reviews/my_favorite_pc_software.php about my favorite PC software. One thing I mentioned was Lookout. Lookout is a plug-in for Outlook 2003 that makes searching unbelievably fast. You can quickly type up a query to look for a very specific email mail message containing a certain phrase or attachment and Lookout would find it for you in less time than it took to type up the query. I have come to rely on it constantly, and I was perfectly willing to pay the $30 for it once it left “preview” phase.
Well, that’s not going to happen because Microsoft “bought”:http://www.lookoutsoft.com/Lookout/ Lookout and hired away its developers. Apparently, they’re going to use the technology in their hope-to-kill-Google MSN search. The fact that Microsoft has set its sights on another little fish it can swallow up and spit out (Netscape, anyone?) is another story. What struck me is the fact that Microsoft does deserve some props for actually buying technology it wanted and giving the original developers some $$ rather than taking what they liked about it and folding it into the OS like some companies that can remain nameless have been known to do. Not that Microsoft hasn’t pulled that trick, I’m sure they have. Many, many times I imagine. But in this case it appears they have done the “right” thing, even if I’m a bit bummed that a favorite plug-in will no longer be developed. I couldn’t care less about MSN Search. Lookout won’t do a thing for me there.
Update: Microsoft has now made Lookout available to all. I did notice this last week, but Kathleen was nice enough to comment with the URL. I took it out of the comment because the long URL didn’t sit right on my main page. So, if you want Lookout (and if you’re running Windows XP, you should), “get it here.”:http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=09b835ee-16e5-4961-91b8-2200ba31ea37&displaylang=en
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