Google Might Be On Yahoo’s Home Page

Senior director’s comments elicit big “huh?”

The Yahoo search experience might at some point change in a very surprising way.  That Bing may take over, we’ve come to accept.  But at least one high-ranking Yahoo employee thinks Google could get a shot, too.

Let’s talk about said employee for a moment.  Burke Culligan is the senior director of product planning and strategy over Yahoo’s front page and My Yahoo, so he’s in a good position to discuss significant adjustments.  Also, Culligan’s worked for Yahoo since October of 2005, so it’s not like he’s some newbie who doesn’t know the score.

Judge the next bit for yourself, then.

Joseph Tartakoff reported, “During an update on the status of the home page, Yahoo senior director Burke Culligan told analysts that the company was not opposed to letting users replace Yahoo search with Microsoft’s Bing or even Google.”

Culligan apparently explained, “Right now, we’re not doing that but long-term that may not be out of the question.  We want to provide the best experience for the user and, in some way, if that was the best experience for the user we might be open to that.”


This led Kit Eaton to speculate that the proposed Microsoft-Yahoo deal is falling apart.  Or perhaps Culligan was talking about what will happen after it expires in ten years.  Regardless, his comments were rather striking, and we’ll keep an ear out for any denials or clarifications that follow.

Google Might Be On Yahoo’s Home Page

 

Bing Bing: Microsoft’s search engine unexpectedly live, but not Live

Microsoft has made its new search engine available ahead of schedule, and is redirecting searches from Live Search to the new site

If you fancied using Microsoft’s new search engine, it’s unexpectedly live at http://www.bing.com/ . (According to Microsoft, it was being opened at the SMX search marketing conference in Seattle on Wednesday.)

Or rather, Microsoft’s new “Decision Engine and consumer brand” is unexpectedly live. Microsoft says:

“Bing is specifically designed to build on the benefits of today’s search engines but begins to move beyond this experience with a new approach to user experience and intuitive tools to help customers make better decisions, focusing initially on four key vertical areas: making a purchase decision, planning a trip, researching a health condition or finding a local business.”

Bing is not Live Search, though obviously it’s based on it, and the current UK beta version still has Live’s front page layout, rather than a menu down the left hand side, which is the format for the US version. The UK also doesn’t seem to have any image hot spots, and other features. To get the “real thing,” go here.

It’s too soon to say whether Bing will attract long-term users, rather than tyre-kickers. However, the reception on Twitter has been reasonably positive.

It does seem to work much better than Google for finding real product info and reviews, where Google’s results are loaded with spam and price comparison rubbish. As @studentsoftware noted on Twitter: “Keyword stuffing that skews Google search results doesn’t quite work in bing. Bing 1 Google 0. Over to you SEO gurus…”

Some Google commands also work — for example, try ["psp go" site:guardian.co.uk] — which could ease the changeover.

The Search History feature, which keeps a list of your previous searches down the left hand side, is obvious but excellent.

But in most respects, Google still rules. The fact is that Bing is an incomplete beta, and while it’s not bad, it’s not actually a match for Google at the moment.

Microsoft knows perfectly well that it’s going to take it “years and years and years” (in Steve Ballmer’s words) to get anywhere in search, if it ever does. It knows it has to overtake Yahoo first. In that sense, comparisons with Google are misguided, though we’re all making them. In reality, Bing is competing with Yahoo and Ask to be the leading Google alternative, and that’s how its success — or failure — should be evaluated.

Acronym note: Microsoft PR reckons Bing is “the sound of found” but the common joke is that it stands recursively for Bing Is Not Google. This has prompted another acronym, Wanger, for Wolfram Alpha’s Not Google Either, Really”

Source : guardian.co.uk