Microsoft is working on a mysterious new service called Sway

Microsoft has bought the domain name Sway.com and appears to be planning a cloud service by that name. Domain name watcher Jamie Zoch noticed the purchase and wrote about his findings yesterday on the site DotWeekly. “I think Microsoft is getting ready to launch the software pretty soon, or it isn’t likely that they would have revealed they were behind the purchase of the domain name yet,” Zoch wrote. It’s hard to imagine exactly what Sway.com might be, although it could well be a cloud-based application, which totally makes sense given Microsoft’s strategic aim these days.

A day after news that Apple has turned on its own content delivery network, it has emerged that Microsoft has registered some domain names that use the term CDN — pointing either to Redmond also readying some kind of new CDN service, or possibly a service that will be based around a CDN. Jamie Zoch at Dot Weekly has discovered that Microsoft has registered the Sway.com domain, along with several variations that point to what Sway could be used for. They include sway-CDN.com, sway-CDN.net, sway-INT.com and sway-INT.net. All of these, including Sway.com, currently redirect to Bing pages with search results for the terms. Along with this, Microsoft has registered a trademark for “Sway” with a fairly wide brief, covering computer software; computer application software; online computer software and software as a service. We have reached out to Microsoft for comment, but the company says it cannot answer any questions with a fast turnaround today (hello, August). “I’ve connected with my colleagues and we’re unable to meet the tight deadline on a Friday afternoon,” a spokesperson told me by email. In other words, no comment.