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Does Bing Have Google Running Scared?

suraj.sun alerts us to an anonymous-source story up at the NY Post, not what we would normally consider a leading source of tech news, claiming that Microsoft's introduction of Bing has alarmed Google. "...co-founder Sergey Brin is so rattled by the launch of Microsoft's rival search engine that he has assembled a team of top engineers to work on urgent upgrades to his Web service, The Post has learned. Brin, according to sources..., is himself leading the team of search-engine specialists in an effort to determine how Bing's crucial search algorithm differs from that used by [Google]. 'New search engines have come and gone in the past 10 years, but Bing seems to be of particular interest to Sergey,' said one insider, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. The move by Brin is unusual, as it is rare these days for the Google founders to have such hands-on involvement in day-to-day operations at the company, the source added." CNet's coverage of the rumor begins with the NY Post and adds in Search Engine Land's speculation on what the world of search would look like if Yahoo exited the field.

11 of 560 comments (clear)

  1. Microsoft is doing what it's best at - Marketing by A+beautiful+mind · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Nothing to see here, move along...

    --
    It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
    Be yourself no matter what they say
  2. Uhuh by jav1231 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Google is Kleenex. You don't even really care that your wife bought Puffs. You'll still call them Kleenex and 9 out of 10 times you're going to pick them first by name. This simply isn't going to go the way of a meme. People aren't just going to jump ship in droves because it's different and not nearly as convenient. Start worrying when the numbers start talking. Getting excited about ANYTHING Microsoft does online is beyond premature. Hell, it might be IM-mature technologically speaking.

  3. Good. by MrMista_B · · Score: 5, Insightful

    This is how market competition is supposed to work.

    Evil or not, a Google without competition inevitably stagnates.

  4. I don't know, but it should by juanergie · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Any self-respecting organization will take a close look at a competitor product, specially when such competitor happens to be one of the world's largest player in the industry.

    Bing will certainly snatch a fraction of the market share owned by Google; modern top management theories demand that Google determines whether the market share lost to the rival will be a single user or a more considerable fraction.

    It is not about Sergei pissing his pants, but about him and his company designing a solid strategy to respond to their competitor's move.

    --
    Aeroespacio.org
  5. Re:Have any of you actually used bing? by MattXBlack · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Maybe because SEOs aren't targeting Bing yet. It's the same reason most viruses are for Windows.

  6. parent is lying by Aurisor · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Parent got rated "+5, insightful"...really? More like "-1, full of shit".

    See for yourself. http://www.google.com/#hl=en&q=hardwood+suppliers&btnG=Google+Search

    I'm no carpenter, but I looked at all of the first 20 links and only one of them was a link farm. The rest were either actual vendors of hardwood floor supplies or legitimate lists of suppliers (like the ones magazines often have). In nearly every case there was an actual physical location or an online store where I could purchase wood.

    If you're going to troll for Microsoft, go do it somewhere where people are too dumb to verify your claims.

  7. Re:Microsoft is doing what it's best at - Marketin by hedwards · · Score: 5, Insightful

    You're probably correct, but by the same token, Google has taken over the search market by competing with incompetence.

    I'm not personally convinced that the Google engine is really that good, in fact by design it's all but worthless for certain types of query. Originally it was designed to be fast and to not need to be able to comprehend the content of the page. Over the years they've had to change that because of the gamesmanship that inevitably occurs when you're at the top. And for the queries that I like to make, it doesn't do any better job of finding things than the older MS search did.

    It's a sad state of affairs, but right now we should all be cheering on MS in their endeavor this one time, they are the only company right now that's even trying to bring Google into a more reasonable share of search queries.

  8. Re:Microsoft is doing what it's best at - Marketin by phantomfive · · Score: 5, Insightful

    You're making a mistake a lot of people make, and that is grouping 'everything that is not tech' into the marketing category. The GP is right, Microsoft is horrible at marketing, have you seen their commercials? Where do you want to go today? Or the infamous Seinfeld shoe commercial? How about the words they choose, like Zune, or WinCE? Compare those to the little logos picked by Intel, the most successful of which may be 'Intel Inside.' Managers had no idea what Intel even was, but they knew they wanted it inside. Intel is always doing some little thing like that, whether Intel inside, or MMC, or the Intel Bunny suits. Compare Intel's website with Microsoft's, which one seems to suck you in more? Which one seems directed at helping you buy? That is marketing. I mean, have you seen Developers Developers, Developers? Do you really think anyone decided to try Microsoft because of that?

    No, Microsoft is not good at marketing. What they do well is business. They have the sharpest business techniques you will ever see a company run. They originally got in the door by convincing IBM to give them the deal. All the way along, they've been making deals that somehow turn out best for them. With windows, they started by playing nice with IBM as long as possible, even promoting OS/2 for a while, until the precise moment when they needed to backstab them. With Netscape, Wordperfect, they kept on pushing their average products until the other companies made a mistep, and they were ready to pounce. If Google ever DOES make a mistake, they will be ready to pounce.

    THAT'S what Microsoft does. They are always waiting and ready when their competitor stumbles.

    --
    Qxe4
  9. Re:Yes, who can forget MS's great marketing by tyrione · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Or, for a more recent example, Democrats bringing up Bush whenever Obama is being criticized.

    One involved 8 years of prosperity and stabilization around the globe with a blowjob wedge issue.

    The second involved 8 years of chaos, global instability, pockets of illegal prosperity with a Trust me and God bless America sock puppet hopin' to get a blow job for his wedge issue and not Torture, Massive Debt, Hate from Allies around the Globe, on and on and on.

    I'll take a guy gettin' his nut off and doing the job over that douche of an alternative.

  10. Re:Microsoft is doing what it's best at - Marketin by slarrg · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Oh, I'm sorry, I thought your own examples would suffice once you recognized there was a difference between marketing and advertising. For example, Bill Gates convincing IBM to allow them to write the DOS for them is pure marketing whereby Bill Gates created his entire software empire by creating a market out of software sales that would have been developed in-house and given away by IBM if he had not done so. In the case of Netscape and Wordperfect, Microsoft made it easy for users of MS alternatives to read competitors' files while only creating content in their own standards which many here call "embrace, extend and extinguish." This is a pure marketing ploy to make your product the only one in the market which reads everything while making it difficult for your competitors to read your output. This makes using MS products the path of least resistance for those reading documents while forcing everyone else to also buy MS products to read the documents produced. This was not an engineering decision but a carefully considered marketing decision.

    But these are just your examples. Microsoft has exhibited marketing excellence throughout its existence from choosing to offer discounts to computer manufacturers who do not sell systems with alternative OSes to MCSEs and Microsoft Solution providers who are provided with primarily marketing resources rather than technical resources. Apparently, much of what you think is just "business" is the particular subset of business known as marketing.

  11. Re:Microsoft is doing what it's best at - Marketin by HermMunster · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Your example is not Embrace, Extend, Extinguish. It has nothing to do with it. The idea of Embrace, Extend, Extinguish in example is:

    Java was developed by Sun as an open standard for programming applets that were OS independent.

    Microsoft licensed that technology under the terms that they not modify it to make it platform specific.

    Microsoft ignored those terms making their VM extensions specific to Windows. They did this so that developers would develop for their VM/implementation thus failing to support the open standards/platform. This training of Developers Developers Developers to the Microsoft way was the extend portion of that business tactic.

    Sun saw this and sued Microsoft. Microsoft was ordered to remove the VM from Windows as it was a violation of the terms of the license. Essentially they embraced Java, then extended it, then attempted to extinguish it but Sun go the upper hand. Then end result was close to a multi-billion dollar judgment against Microsoft.

    That's embrace, extend, extinguish. You are talking in terms of proprietary vendor lock in.

    --
    You can lead a man with reason but you can't make him think.