Digital Home Thoughts: Does Netbook = Low Cost Small Notebook PC?

"The marketing geniuses in Redmond are at it again. From the folks who brought us "Zune," "Bing," and "MSN Search Toolbar with Windows Desktop Search" comes a new name for the venerable netbook. Digitimes reports that Microsoft will refer to netbooks as "low cost small notebook PCs," according to Microsoft's Steven Guggenheimer. Try saying that ten times fast. Microsoft's rationale for the name-change? A netbook can do more than just get you online, so it should be called something else. There's no arguing that—some new netbooks hitting the market can even handle 1080p video, thanks to a bolstered graphics system."

At first I was thinking that this was simply a result of the pending Psion lawsuit, but then I recalled that the issue had been dropped and the term netbook was again fair game. The article comes up with a pretty simple reason for the more descriptive name - Windows 7. Microsoft does not want the everything in the netbook category to be eligible for the starter version of Windows 7, especially if they are capable of running a more expensive version of the OS. Regardless, I'm still calling them netbooks.