Bing Jingle, Not So Good

A few weeks ago, we reported that Microsoft had launched a contest for a jingle about Bing – the company’s new search engine. The winning jingle would bring the creator $500.

The company has just announced the winner and, according to TechCrunch, "as bad as the jingle is, the video is much, much worse. It’s some guy in pajama pants doing really bad interpretive dance nonsense with awful effects and a Bing backdrop."

Take a look for yourself. It is awful. It looks like those voting for the videos might have had a little fun with Microsoft.

Bing Gains (a Little) Ground on Google

Bing, Microsoft’s new search engine, is gaining ground on its chief rival, search engine giant Google, reports Art Technica.

Bing was launched in June and quickly picked up 8% of the search engine market share, mostly from Yahoo.com. Google held 78% of the search engine market that month. In July, however, while Bing’s share of the market increased 1%, Google’s dropped by the same amount.

Bing has several interesting features that have prompted people to take a look. Many of them appear to be staying with the Microsoft product.

Along with Yahoo’s 10% market share, and last week’s announcement of a deal between Yahoo and Microsoft that would make Bing the search engine for all of Yahoo's sites, Google’s search engine dominance looks like it might be in for a challenge.

Stay tuned.

(Never tried Bing? Take a blind search test.)

Turn Bing Searches into RSS Feeds

Are you doing research on a topic, and want to save your results and be made aware when new information about that topic is published on the web? Bing, Microsoft's new "decision" engine, allows you to convert any search into an RSS feed. Just add the feed to your favorite feed reader (such as Google Reader) and the top 10 results from the search will be added to your feed reader.

To create an RSS feed in Bing, conduct a search, and at the end of the URL from the search results screen add the following text: &format=rss. For example, here is the URL for a Bing search of Lance Armstrong: http://www.bing.com/search?q=lance+armstrong&go=&form=QBLH&qs=n. Here is the URL to turn the search into an RSS feed: http://www.bing.com/search?q=lance+armstrong&go=&form=QBLH&qs=n&format=RSS.

Please note that RSS feeds can only be created for website searches, not for video or image searches.

Sing about Bing and Win $500

Microsoft has launched a contest that invites you to sing a jingle about Bing – the company’s new search engine which has launched to positive reviews. Just create a video of yourself singing (no more than 5 minutes long) and upload it on Bing’s YouTube channel by July 31. Then, have all your friends vote on it, and you could win $500. Voting has begun and will continue through August 5.

Read the contest rules.

[via TechChrunch]

See Which Search Engine You Really Prefer With Blind Search

I have been playing around with Microsoft's new search engine, Bing. I wanted to give Bing a fair shot at being my go-to search engine, but I also wanted to make sure that I was getting the most accurate results.

This led me to a great site, Blind Search, which allows the user to do a simultaneous search of Bing, Google, and Yahoo. The results are displayed blindly (with no identifying label) in three columns. After you vote for the column that best matches your preferred results, the name of the search engine that you chose will appear. You can see which search engine most frequently presents your preferred results without the bias of knowing the site you are on.

Here is a screenshot of the search before you vote for the search engine of your choosing:

Here is a screenshot of the search after you vote.

After using Blind Search for awhile, I quickly noticed that Bing and Google produced the best results for me. The great results that Bing produced were quite surprising as I have always been a die-hard Google-r.

I definitely encourage everyone to check out "Blind Search," and see which search engine works best for you.

Bing, Microsoft's New Search Engine

Microsoft's search engine, Live Search, has transitioned to a new product called Bing. While it may not be a Google killer anytime soon, it has been making its mark already by overtaking Yahoo's market share during its first week of release. Microsoft has spent considerable time and money developing this new search engine. Let's take a look at the some of the features.

The Look

Bing's layout is quite clean. The main search box is prominently displayed. A brief list of searchable categories is listed on the left side of the page. What is unique about the Bing homepage is the background image. This image, which changes everyday, features clickable hotspots that conduct searches related to the background image. For example, the above Bing screenshot, from June 6, is a picture of Omaha Beach in Normandy, France. The hotspots linked to searches, maps, images, and videos about the D-Day invasion.

Search

Search results are displayed much like Google's, with some results linking directly to content, not just to the homepage. Additionally, many sites feature a preview option. By moving your mouse to the right of the result, content from the site will pop up in a window to give a preview of the site.

Depending on the topic, search results are often returned with an index of related search terms. For example, when searching "diabetes," a menu appears on the left side showing the search term, and beneath there are options for articles, symptoms, diet, prevention, and more. These results depend on your search term. Another interesting feature is that when you search for a medical condition, the first result listed is an article from an authoritative source such as MayoClinic.com or Medlineplus.gov.

Bing also keeps a history that logs all of your searches. While this is helpful for users who want to maintain privacy, this can easily be cleared or turned off.

Special Features

Bing has several other features. One of the most interesting is video preview. When you search for videos, you can hover your mouse over any search result and can watch a brief preview of that video with audio.

Another great feature is the image search. Images by default are displayed as thumbnails. To see the image source, just hover your mouse over the image. And, unlike Google's image search, you don't have to click to go to the next page to see more results. In Bing, just scroll down through the list to see more images. Images are refreshed as you scroll.

While Bing may not replace Google for your everyday web searching, it is an interesting product and it worth a try. For more information about Bing, go here.