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Microsoft Bing Search Launches Early Preview

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the badda-bing dept.

An anonymous reader writes to mention that Microsoft has rolled out a preview version of their Bing Search site earlier than expected. Microsoft's hope at putting a dent in Google's ubiquitous search presence, Bing has several new features including Bing Cashback, Bing Video, and Bing xRank. "Bing Video is really great because of the new thumbnail video feature. Try searching for E3 at Bing Video and you'll quickly see how it works. Simply hover over a video and it starts playing instantly. This is fantastic from the consumer's point of view but what about the publisher? It's almost like Microsoft is stepping on their toes by deploying video search in this manner. Would a user still click on to the site if they can watch the whole video from within the search results? Fair use definitely comes into mind here. Perhaps there should be a 30second limitation on the 'thumbnail preview?'"

11 of 310 comments (clear)

  1. Weird... by FredFredrickson · · Score: 5, Interesting

    What's interesting, for me, about other search engines and their "usability" is the fact that my eyes are trained to parse google results. Google search results look official and informative. I can't use Yahoo or MSN (or Bing for this matter) because their search results look sterile.

    Sometimes it's the lack of information- as little as giving me the page size (7kb). Sometimes it's the margins. Bing has a left margin. Google doesn't.

    I'm not saying that these differences make a BAD difference, except this: Internet users learn quickly about scams. The first time I accidentally clicked on those fake search results on an ad-search mis-direction page, I learned to pick up on these differences quickly.

    In fact, it's subtle, but you can usually tell when a computer has an infection that hijacks your google results- because they don't look right (older infections changed the results, new ones redirect REAL results.. but that's a different conversation).

    The point is- my mouse won't go near, let alone click, on things that I think are tricks or advertisements. For some reason, I trust google a lot. So much that my eyes are trained to see it's results and disregard others. I'm reluctant to click on bing results.

    I encourage slashdot users to try bing out, and tell me it doesn't look foreign to you! Tell me you don't feel weird clicking it's results! The internet trains you quickly that you are to embrace familiarity, because you will be quickly punished for not doing so.

    --
    Belief? Hope? Preference?The Existential Vortex
    1. Re:Weird... by Jake+Griffin · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Some of the things I use quite a bit on google search are the calculator feature, as well as just asking a basic trivia question that comes up while I'm browsing. Both such examples fail on bing. "1+1=?" returned a bunch of nonsense, which is expected because bing doesn't have a calculator, but "How tall is Steve Nash?" returned his stats in the first result with a picture, which is nice, but it is not his height. You have to look to the third result to see how tall he is. Google on the other hand returns this as the first result: Steve Nash â" Height: 6 FT 3 in. Very simple, quick answer. This is the reason I will stick with Google for the time being.

      --
      SIG FAULT: Post index out of bounds.
    2. Re:Weird... by causality · · Score: 2, Interesting

      "so far it's found things that Google didn't and missed a whole load of Google-oriented spam sites" Until the spammers note that Bing's marketshare is big enough to set their sights on. It's the whole exploits are concentrated on the most popular software out there paradigm again. Oh yes, I completely agree. It took a while for Google to become so spam-infested though, so hopefully we get a reasonable break in the meantime. I do like some aspects (video included) of this though. I find the shopping to be about as good as Google's, nothing special. Could definitely do without the noisy background, though. I crave simplicity! Indeed. Is actually the one thing putting me off making it my homepage, but I'm going to do it just to give things a try. Have been less satisfied with Google of late - not necessarily their fault as such, but there's so much targeting of them that's it's getting harder to sort wheat from chaff. Cheers, Ian

      Maybe the best defense against the spammer is multiple successful search engines owned and operated by different companies. In other words, I don't like the idea of a Google monoculture any more than I like the Windows monoculture and the instant widespread success of malware that it enables. With spammers and others who want to "game" the search engines, it seems to me that the same principle applies.

      --
      It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Einstein
  2. You want to know something funny? by E.+Edward+Grey · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I realized just now that if some other company had started up and created a new search engine called "Bing" I would probably find it really charming. But when Microsoft does it, it just seems like The Itchy & Scratchy & Poochie Show. The human subconscious is a player-hater.

    --

    ---don't make me break out my red pen.

  3. Re:And Slashdot couldn't even link to it? by neoform · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I wonder how Bing stands up against Google..

    http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3604/3585051300_d23a37a32e_o.png

    --
    MABASPLOOM!
  4. Re:Google and Bing side by side.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Try a side-by-side of "antitrust m", too.

  5. Search for "Linux" results in Microsoft products? by stefanlasiewski · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I noticed that also.

    Here are the first four "Search suggestions" for when I type "linux":

    linux
    linux windows
    linux microsoft
    linux vista

    Is this because Microsoft inserted itself into those search suggestions? Or is it because the majority of Bingers are using Microsoft products and thus the results are skewed ?

    --
    "Can of worms? The can is open... the worms are everywhere."
  6. Re:Yeah but.... by jamesmcm · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Microsoft has been using a lot of recursive, GNU-style acronyms recently like XNA - XNA's Not Acronymed and now Bing - Bing Is Not Google.

    Maybe they think this is why everyone is using GNU now? :P

  7. Re:Did anonymous even try the video search? by hansamurai · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I also rather like the image results, I can't speak for the actual images themselves, but the way they're presented is so much nicer than Google with a convenient dynamic load as you continue scrolling down the page. Live search did this too.

    Plus they find 1500 images for my site, five times as many as Google.

    --
    Reviewing just the first hour of video games.
  8. Looks like a parking site or a DNS redirect. by msimm · · Score: 4, Interesting

    If I'd hit your link on accident I'd have assumed it was just another domineer squatting a high value (?) name. Who ever designed the page layout probably doesn't know the first thing about composition, my eyes can't seem to decide where to focus because all the blocks seem to be competing. Like an uglier version of google with over 1/3 of the top of the page (all you see before scrolling) dedicated to advertisements with not one, but TWO search boxes (the second simply to search within microsoft.com) which will probably frustrate and confuse as many users as it might help.

    --
    Quack, quack.
  9. That does not mean what you think it does by linumax · · Score: 2, Interesting

    AFAIK, suggested results are generated by going through what users have already searched for. It's quite likely that a pre-beta search engine, which has so far been prominently used by Microsoft employees or partners would have a "bias" towards Windows.
    Looks like most of these people have been looking for Linux and Windows comparisons instead trying to download Linux.