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Microsoft To Launch Homegrown Search Engine

Posted by timothy on from the humboldt-county dept.

Mr. Christmas Lights writes "While Google is currently the king-of-the-hill in search engines, Microsoft continues to lag in market share and uses Yahoo's technology/results. But Cnet reports that they'll launch on Thursday their own homegrown search engine , although it appears this is mostly a face-lift (despite a year of development and $100 million investment). According to Bill Gates, they 'will introduce a homegrown web crawler and algorithmic search engine ... later this year,' which is almost certainly their tech preview (you can look at this now) -- but will that be ready for prime-time in less than two months?"

25 of 300 comments (clear)

  1. About time by lightdarkness · · Score: 4, Funny

    I've seen their cralwer (their new one I presume) around for at least a month, without any indication on where the results were being shown. At least I have another spider to add to my list of robots that steal my bandwidth.

    1. Re:About time by b374 · · Score: 3, Funny

      Is this their crawler?

  2. So by jbartone · · Score: 4, Funny

    Who's actually going to use this instead of Google?

    1. Re:So by zakezuke · · Score: 5, Funny

      Since it'll probably end up being default start-up page in IE, lots.

      Fortunately IE has enough in the way of exploits so the default start-up page gets hijacked often enough.

      --
      There is no sanctuary. There is no sanctuary. SHUT UP! There is no shut up. There is no shut up.
    2. Re:So by Titusdot+Groan · · Score: 5, Funny
      Did your company fire them?

      I've got a running gag with my team that if I can find the answer to their problem in 3 google searches I get their pay for that week. The number of dumb question I get is WAY down.

    3. Re:So by jimicus · · Score: 2, Funny

      This week I discovered someone in my office who knew nothing about google.

      What's google?

  3. Last Post... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    ... for Google?

  4. Search for Windows..... by alistair · · Score: 5, Funny

    No Results Found

    Needs some fine tuning before it's ready for the prime time, me thinks.

    1. Re:Search for Windows..... by jai0 · · Score: 2, Funny

      Just searched for "where do you want to go today".. the first result was "Where do you want to go birding in Africa today?"!

  5. the word preview... by Jimmy+The+Tulip · · Score: 1, Funny

    Instead of using words like "alpha" or "beta" they are using a word "preview". i dont know what that means ?
    btw, the font in which "search tech preview" is written and the color and the shadow..sucks!

  6. Prediction for most popular queries on day 1... by seanellis · · Score: 4, Funny

    "mozilla firefox" download
    google

    --
    Sean Ellis
    Follow OfQuack's antics on Twitter.
  7. Algorithmic search engine? WTF? by jagripino · · Score: 5, Funny

    Don't *all* search engines have to have, hmm, some kind of algorithm in them?

    Marketing speak confuses me! Please stop!

    1. Re:Algorithmic search engine? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

      Not the new Brute Force Search Engine (TM) I'm working on.

  8. Tech Preview? by beders · · Score: 3, Funny

    No results for my name or a random word. More worryingly no result for "porn". Got a long way to go chaps, $100 million seems a little steep for a input box linked to an error page...

    --
    Brocklesby Park Cricket Club
  9. Dutch? by tompercival · · Score: 3, Funny

    Fantastic... dutch search results - just what I was after too.

  10. Biased by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    At least they are not biased Click Here

  11. The best part of all... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    is that when I searched for "Windows XP crack" it found a great page about an underground piracy ring called the SPA, they even gave me a number to call 1-800-388-PIR8. Thanks Microsoft!

  12. Best search engine by Libor+Vanek · · Score: 4, Funny

    Just try to search "best search engine" and enjoy what comes out:
    http://www.search.msn.com/results.aspx?FORM=SRCHWB &q=best%20search%20engine

  13. Re:Microsoft's problem by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny
    Shhhh. Microsoft blowing 100s of millions of dollars that will gain them nothing is exactly what is required.

    The more targets they have to aim at, the more it will drain them.

  14. Re:Search engine wars by northcat · · Score: 2, Funny

    It seems that Microsoft might just be trying to cut in on the business that Google, Yahoo, AskJeeves and all those other engines are making.

    No, Bill Gates is just trying to impress his wife. "Look at my search engine honey, search for 'bill gates nude'. I bet you have never seen THAT before!"

  15. Re:Doubtful this will take any ground. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny
    I say it time and time again.. Microsoft is not a company of innovation
    For the love of Pete, have you forgotten about Clippy? I mean before Clippy, how many bug-eyed talking paper clips did you know?
  16. Search Results by chia_monkey · · Score: 4, Funny

    Oh my. I can just see the search results now:

    Search entry: "Antarctic Penguin"

    Search Result: A paperclip pops up on your screen and says "It appears you are searching for a penguin. Did you know Microsoft servers are cheaper to run than Linux? Would you like to buy one now?"

    --

    "He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lampposts...for support rather than illumination." - Andrew Lang
  17. Re:MSN Bombs by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    Hah, the first result for "Worst operating system" is great. That PDF book gave me a good laugh.

    Microsoft compares Unix to a virus because it is small, portable, and has the ability to commandeer resources. So what Windows isn't a virus because it is bloated, only runs on the i386 architecture, and squanders resources?

  18. haha by deander2 · · Score: 2, Funny

    at the bottom of my search:

    "Results 1 - 10 of about 8 containing deander2"

    first off: "about 8"?!?
    second, WTF? can't they check for 10 results?

    --
    http://kered.org
  19. how did you find such a person? by jxyama · · Score: 2, Funny
    >You would be amazed. This week I discovered someone in my office who knew nothing about google.

    i imagine you had to use google to find such a rare person? :P