Microsoft now owns Microsoft-Sony.com and Sony-Microsoft.com, say what? [Updated]

Now this is an interesting development. Apparently as of June 14th, Microsoft now owns the domains Microsoft-Sony.com and Sony-Microsoft.com, reports gaming site Zoknowsgaming. Updates below.

The domain registrations were discovered by a member of the NeoGAF forums, V_Ben, who offered them without comment besides, “who knows. Just, who knows. Probably WP7 phones.”

We’ve verified the two domain registrations with separate lookup services and yes, Microsoft does now own both of those domains. While the possibilities set the mind abuzz, the most immediate thoughts of what the domains could be used for turn to a joint gaming console venture between the two companies.

The other major possibility is that of some sort of acquisition or merging of the companies, but that seems much less likely than a partnership.

Sony and Microsoft, while highly competitive in the gaming space, with the two of the most popular gaming consoles on the market, have a long history of partnership in the PC space. Sony is a large licensor of Microsoft’s Windows operating system, which powers most Sony Vaio PC’s.

Currently, neither of the domains resolve to anything, so whatever plans that Microsoft has for these isn’t ready for public consumption. What do you think that the possible uses for Microsoft-Sony.com and Sony-Microsoft.com are?

Update. Microsoft’s VP of Corporate Communications, Frank Shaw, has announced via Twitter that Sony is a ‘great MS partner’ and that this is ‘just a defensive domain hold’.

This could mean that Microsoft is holding the domains against acquisition by domain squatters or opportunists, or that the Microsoft is simply protecting the domains from being snagged by parody accounts. It is worth noting that the account used to post the original message on the NeoGAF forums was only 1 day old, leading some to speculate that this actually may be some type of PR move.