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Bing Search Tainted By Pro-Microsoft Results
bdcny7927 writes "Just as Bing is gaining popularity, some disturbingly pro-Microsoft and anti-Apple search results are rearing their ugly heads. Case in point: a search on Bing for the phrase, 'Why is Windows so expensive?' returned this as the top link: 'Why are Macs so expensive.' That's right. You're not hallucinating."
Surprised, why?
I am not stubborn. I am right!
...are you really surprised?
THL phish sticks
Search string: "Why is Windows so expensive?"
Results:
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Microsoft to offer Family Pack for Windows 7 Home Premium | TalkBack
If so don't PC users ask WHY is Windows so expensive? Cheapest upgrade for Win 7 is 50 and that's temporarily for early adopters (119 later) Snow Leopard is only 29 for all Leopard ...
o talkback.zdnet.com/5208-12354-0.html?forumID=1&threadID=66314&messageID=1250260
o Cached page
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MacNN | Acer: Home Premium is the real Vista
"Hmmm, I'll have to think about that... Why is Windows so expensive?" "That's the Microsoft tax." "Doesn't e v e r y b o d y use Windows?" "Not anymore."
o www.macnn.com/articles/06/10/27/acer.on.windows.vista
o Cached page
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Do you need more than Windows 7 Home Premium? | TalkBack on ZDNet
If so don't PC users ask WHY is Windows so expensive? Cheapest upgrade for Win 7 is 50 and that's temporarily for early adopters (119 later) Snow Leopard is only 29 for all Leopard ...
o talkback.zdnet.com/5208-12354-0.html?forumID=1&threadID=66219&messageID=1249894
o Cached page
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Rittman Mead Consulting Blog Archive Virtually there
I suppose the next thing is to build a Windows VM for the stuff that needs Microsoft Windows (OBI SE-ONE, for example) - but why is Windows so expensive to license? ...
o www.rittmanmead.com/2007/11/21/virtually-there
o Cached page
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PC World Community: Hollywood's Victory Over The Pirate Bay
Why is Windows so expensive to buy in a box, when Dell can buy it in bulk for a couple dollars? How much money does Bill Gates need? What is fair trade? ...
o forums.pcworld.com/message/209250
o Cached page
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PC World Community: Windows XP User: I'm No Thief
At least I think it is. Why is windows so expensive in the first place? They're totally ripping us off!!
o forums.pcworld.com/thread/60075?start=30&tstart=0
o Cached page
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ffextensionguru.wordpress.com - Traffic Details from Alexa
why is windows so expensive; new tab homepage; guru blog; the book of mozilla; mozilla weekly; ie 8 windows update; primo pdf; tabs open relative; flash player updates
o www.alexa.com/siteinfo/ffextensionguru.wordpress.com
I don't care why you're posting AC
... why are Macs so expensive?
That's why I have often taken my car to repair shops that are nothing but repair shops, not gas stations or tire stores or whatever doing car repair on the side. They have to live on the basis of their car repairs, and they are likely to pay attention to that, and if they do bad repairs they will go out of business.
Similarly, Google lives by its search engine, and people at Google know it. There is nothing more important to Google than returning good search results, and if somebody else starts returning better ones Google is in deep trouble.
It won't take much for me to conclude that a search engine operated by somebody like Microsoft or Apple is biased. A biased search engine isn't going to get me the results I want (unless, I guess, I agree with the bias, but in that case I run the risk of learning nothing and simply being confirmed in my ignorance). If Microsoft wants me to use Bing, they're going to have to be extra careful to avoid the appearance of bias.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Yes, the mac link appears under the google results. However, the other top google results are all about the Windows OS. The bing results has NO results about Windows OS on the first page.
-- Don't Tase me, bro!
For example Expedia. Perhaps travel queries are tainted too. And who knows what else.
Hey Slashdot, how about covering the fact that KDE 4.3 [kde.org] was just released today?
Ops.
Any life is made up of a single moment, the moment in which a man finds out, once and for all, who he is.
Except that putting that same query to Google will give this result in the first page:
http://www.techradar.com/news/computing/apple/why-are-macs-so-expensive--609128
Why would I use another search engine when I can use Google?
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
It's not specifically pro-MS or anti-Apple. It's just that whatever their ranking algorithm is rates yahoo answers as a better source than other sites. Search engines have to weight sites somehow; if all sources of pages were equally good authorities, we'd all still be using altavista.
is competition good, or is duplication of effort bad?
Actually, yes. On the main page, click the minus sign next to the title. You can then pick why you don't like it.
Theoretically if enough people do it, we could kick it back off the front page. That seems unlikely in this case though.
-- "So they told me that using the download page to download something was not something they anticipated." - Bill Gates
And "is windows expensive" returns just plain anti-Windows results. "why is windows expensive" (eliminating the 'so') returns more neutral responses. This is just a difference in the search algorithms. I wonder how many phrases were tried before the authors obtained suitably pro-MS results for their troll.
Maybe he's requesting a dupe?
'This writing business. Pencils and what-not. Over-rated if you ask me. Silly stuff. Nothing in it' - Eeyore
TFA states that they stopped doing it. He screencapped his results, but it's not surprising that you don't see it now.
At least.. for now.. with those search queries..
But can you trust them to give honest results later on when the heat is off again?
Change the search to, "Why is your mom so expensive?" and the first result is "Why Are Bulldog Puppies So Expensive" but somehow I doubt that Microsoft is "pro-your mom" and "anti-bulldog" puppies.
I work for a large bank... suddenly, our mandated IE 7, which used to allow you to add other search engines, now only allows Bing. (in the search bar.. it isn't like they've blocked Google). But it is still quite annoying, and things like this don't get deployed by accident to thousands of employees.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.