Microsoft accidentally reveals Tulalip, its new social network

Microsoft has let slip a splash page for what looks like a social network called Tulalip.

The leak was spotted by Fusible, who noticed that Microsoft had acquired the domain name socl.com. Heading over to that URL revealed the landing page for a new social network.

The screen, pictured above, indicates that Tulalip is some kind of social search tool, which could tie into Bing. There are buttons to sign in with Facebook and Twitter, which makes us think the service won't require a separate Microsoft account.

None of the links worked unfortunately, and the page has now been taken down, replaced by a message that reads: 'Thanks for stopping by. Socl.com is an internal design project from a team in Microsoft Research which was mistakenly published to the Web. We didn't mean to, honest.'

D'aww, bless 'em. It might be an internal project at the moment, but we'd bet our last pair of clean socks that Microsoft's planning on launching some kind of social wotsit. Google's stepping its game up with the Zuckerberg-bothering Google+, so we'd expect the Redmond bunch to bring something to the social-networking table too.

One of Microsoft's biggest assets is its Xbox Live service, which is almost a full-blown social network in itself. We'd love to see this tied into any future services.

We're not sure about the name, though -- Tulalip doesn't exactly roll off the tongue and into the heart. Still, that's what we said about the HTC Wildfire, and Tulalip does have a certain flowery charm we suppose.

As an extra tidbit, Tulalip is the name of a group of Native American tribes located near Redmond, and it's pronounced 'tuh-lay-lup'.

Would you be interested in a social network from Microsoft? Or is the very notion ridiculous? Let us know the correct answer in the comments or on our Facebook page.

Image credit: Fusible