By: Senior staff writer – Easton Ellsworth

TechCrunch reports on the new Microsoft Live.com social portal. Many others are buzzing about it, saying it might just be a FriendFeed or Facebook Connect killer. Here’s the press release.

TechStartups says meh.

Why?

1. Late to the game

Microsoft’s socialized integration of some of its existing Live services is admirable, but long overdue. So many of its users are likely to remain faithful to other services that they’ve been using for a long time that I don’t see why it’s even bothered to try to catch up.

2. If it looks like an attempt to catch up …

… it probably is. Why isn’t Microsoft taking three steps ahead of the competition instead of barely rushing up to join them?

3. Hyperlink hell

Seriously, what is up with http://windowslivewire.spaces.live.com/Blog/cns!2F7EB29B42641D59!17757.entry as a blog post link?

That’s just one of many structural complaints I have about the way MS runs and names its services.

I’m still trying to remember whether they want me to call it Microsoft Live, Windows Live, Live, or some combo of the three.

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Here’s the problem, Microsoft. Millions of people are hanging out at Facebook and LinkedIn and Plaxo and Twitter and FriendFeed and Flickr and BlogCatalog and dozens of other places online already. Just because they still hold on to that dusty old Hotmail account doesn’t mean they’ll come running back to embrace your new social portal within minutes of getting word that it’s launched. You’ve gotta give people a reason to use Live instead of any other service – a reason so powerful it makes switching away from Live seem ludicrous to even consider.

And TechStartups doesn’t see that reason … yet. We’ll see.