- ‹ previous
- 762 of 2798
- next ›
Is Anyone Binging?
Responding to a commenter who says Microsoft doesn't really understand branding, E.D. Kain says:
Exactly right. Nor do they understand connectivity and product overlap the way Google does. Google connects your email, chat, documents, search, and even browser now, etc. into basically one product, and with upcoming innovations like Wave and their OS that connectivity and overlap will just become far, far more effective. (Apple has done this fairly well also with hardware added into the mix)
Microsoft has tried with “Windows Live” and all that, but there are just too many gaps, too many brands, etc. I mean “bing” is now part of the whole cadre of Microsoft products, but is it really tied into them well? Why Microsoft hasn’t made their Windows platform more webby is beyond me. And why they make it so difficult to integrate everything is also confusing.
I'm out of touch on this stuff these days, but in fairness to Microsoft, doesn't a lot of this have to do with antitrust rules that don't allow them to integrate everything the way they'd like to? 
My understanding has always been that if they could get away with it they'd basically merge every piece of software they own into a single platform and then make it next to impossible to use anything else. But they can't.
In any case, the motivation for the original post was David Pogue's piece in the New York Times about Microsoft's new search engine, Bing. Anyone have any opinions they'd like to share on this? I use it a lot for image searches, but not so much for ordinary text searches. Partly this is because Bing doesn't seem to have an Advanced Search page, which means I'd have to memorize whatever Boolean concatenation rules they use if I want to do anything more complicated than a search for the latest Michael Jackson news. Sure, that's lazy of me, but Google works pretty well, so even a small nuisance makes all the difference between using something new and skipping it.
On the other hand, it's sort of interesting to see what Bing comes up with in its "Related Searches" list. If I type in my name, I get a bunch of expected stuff, but also Maitland Ward. Huh? Who's that? (Says here that she's an actress born in Long Beach who attended the same university as me. Is that all it takes?) But even at that I'm lucky. Matt Yglesias gets paired up with Michelle Malkin and Ann Coulter. Atrios gets Michelle Malkin and Atrio Insurance. Jane Hamsher gets Bill Clinton. (She also gets Jane Hamsher Death, which seems kind of ghoulish.)
Oh, and I like the background artwork on the Bing home page. Very soothing. Not enough to make me switch from Google on a regular basis, but soothing anyway.
Advanced is there
Bing has an advanced button, though I don't remember seeing it originally. But more to the point, most of its special search characters are exactly the same as google's , including the '-' for negative, the site: prefix, etc. so there's nothing to remember there.
As for me, I tried Bing on a bunch of sample searches originally, especially more difficult searches, and google was better every time. And I haven't really gone back to it since. Most everyone I know has more or less the same story. I suspect it will get better as time goes on.
What's weird about the Pogue article is that all the examples he gives (buying a camera, the NY-LA flight, the unnamed celebrity search) are exactly the same examples I read about when Bing was first released. He throws in a couple of recent problems, but the whole thing reads like he re-wrote the media materials MS put out a month ago.
Bing does seem to have an
Bing does seem to have an advanced search: [cannot insert a link] but the option seems to appear AFTER an initial search has been done -- so you use it to refine. And it works differently from Google's -- selecting different search attributes via tabs and adding to the search.
As for integration -- exactly. Both the US and the EU have been after Microsoft for integrating things -- while its competitors can do so with immunity. (Apple even bundles hardware with software). Maybe someone understands this -- I don't.
Posting here is confusing these days. Right now I see a CAPTCHA but not an input box into which to type. What with that and the link filter nagging, it's been several minutes and I still can't get this through.
Just in case any MJ web
Just in case any MJ web people are interested -- my comment finally went through even though I did not type in the CAPTCHA that was displayed -- because there was no text box to type it into.
And if anyone reads this -- change that "Alternately" to "Alternatively" in the comment posting instructions -- it's embarrassing.
"but in fairness to
"but in fairness to Microsoft, doesn't a lot of this have to do with antitrust rules that don't allow them to integrate everything the way they'd like to?"
Indeed it does. Google doesn't have the OS market share to run into those precise difficulties, or they'd be facing similar difficulties.
Nor does Apple.
I don't believe that
I don't believe that anti-trust laws are meant to apply different restrictions on how companies design their products depending on their marker share. Perhaps a lawyer can clarify this.
It may not be a legal
It may not be a legal problem necessarily, but it seems likely that they'd be skittish about doing anything that would get them drawn back into court again. OTOH, going up against Google in Google's backyard requires a quality product, which is so often Microsoft's achilles heel. When they challenged Netscape, a) there were a lot more new customers to capture than there are now in the search engine market, and b) Navigator was going down the tubes while IE was decently workable. Google's not nearly so likely to just start sucking.
Seamlessness isn't a problem for MS
tagged as:- solution
Making all applications work seamlessly cannot be a reason for anti-trust legislators to sue Microsoft.
The problem arises when they stop others from tapping into / working with those applications.
So if MS had any brains, they WOULD make everything - Word, IE, Windows, Excel etc. etc. - work seamlessly, then leaving me very little reason to ever even go to Google (except for the relevancy bit, for now)
It's going to take a long,
It's going to take a long, long time for my residual resentment of Microsoft to wear off. I guess that's what happens when you try to coerce someone into using your products.
Alternatively, every time I start using a Google product, it's because I tried it out and found it better-designed than the competition (and, of course, free). They may be just as intent on dominating the industry as Microsoft, but their apparent willingness to let me decide when and where to use their services goes a long way towards building goodwill.
More broadly, I think that in recent years, reporters have tried to downplay any distinctions between Google and its competition, but the "Don't be evil" mantra still manifests itself in subtle and not-so-subtle ways to Google's end users and it's ultimately why it has far more room for error than Microsoft.
Which product did Microsoft
Which product did Microsoft coerce you to use and how? And how did its competition (Apple) not coerce you in this respect?
I have many complaints about Microsoft products, but I do not understand complaints that have to do with coercing or integrating. Apple will not allow you to use its software without its hardware, and vice versa. Much of its appeal to consumers comes from integrating hardware, OS and applications in a coherent whole (which then can be a lot more trouble-free). Microsoft is hounded by the DOJ for trying to do only part of that.
There are a variety of ways
There are a variety of ways that microsoft products suck :) A lot of them have to do with a very slow rate of innovation on practical matters. It's amazing to me how many third party plugins and integrated programs thrive for decades because microsoft office continuously lacks certain key functionalities.
As for coercion, I think you need to read up on monopolies and anti-trust laws. I'd say market share and propietary format and platform incompatibility are the primary reasons people buy microsoft products. The little guys generally at least make an attempt to translate microsoft formats and generally rely on open source or otherwise available formats. They're selling points are usually based on functionality and paying attention to the needs of the typical (or atypical) user.
...
I find Google's spelling and ads are better targeted.
The output from Bing is formatted exactly as if they were using the licenses business version of Google...
...So I would I switch from google, which loads fast, image light, and spells things correctly for me?
Not that I think some competition is bad, mind, but.
More advanced searcg
Speaking of more advanced search, Google or Bing would go far with me if you could search similar to the way you can on Lexis or Westlaw, for example....
KABC & 198! & "Michael Jackson" % ("dead" "funeral" "pop") /p talk radio
to try and find something about the other Michael Jackson that was on the radio. Just a quick example that came to mind, but those terms and connectors are what I want.
Hey, keep in mind that
Hey, keep in mind that Google doesn't charge the end user for -anything-; all their revenue is advertising and providing their technology to corporate customers.
MS's real worry is that Google's line of business will keep expanding until they can take a Linux base and blow it up into an OS which Google will then hand out for free, just like all the other stuff it does for free. Or Google might take Open Office and use it as the core for an office suite that, again, it would give away for free. (Or it could engineer either one from scratch, I suppose.)
This would absolutely gut MS's revenue stream, of course.
That's why Google is MS's biggest strategic competitor - not because it competes directly against either portion of MS's core business (operating systems and office suites), but because it's the one company with both the free development funds and the distribution inclination to put together a market-killing alternative.
i hate bing
the search engine, not the singer.
Interconnectivity can be a pain in the patoot
tagged as:- result
Like many people out here in the blogosphere, I blog, and comment, under a name that's obviously not my own. I've also got two gmail addresses: one with my real name in it, and another which doesn't, which I can use with blogs and whatnot.
The problem is that I can't have my 'real name' email open, and blog (or comment on Blogger blogs) as low-tech cyclist, at the same time: if my real-name gmail is open, it wants me to post comments under my real name. And if I post a comment on a Blogger blog as low-tech cyclist, or post to my own blog, gmail logs me out of my real-name account, and opens up my other account. So I either do a lot of switching back and forth, or I throw up my hands and choose one identity for awhile.
Thanks, Google, for your really stupid interconnectivity. Please take it and stick it where the sun doesn't shine.
@low-tech-cyclist: there's
tagged as:- solution
@low-tech-cyclist: there's several ways to do what you want. Personally, my wife and i both have similar browsing habits and we both have accounts on the same sites and services and well, we both use the same computers. I suggest you search for ways people have addressed these issues (mostly firefox addins like cookiepie). But specific to Google accounts, if you have different instances of a browser open (different windows not different tabs) and each one can access a different google account without interfering with the others. hope that helps.
Microsoft was found by a
Microsoft was found by a court of law to be illegally abusing its monopoly position in the operating system market to achieve dominance in other markets. The judgment constrained them from tying the browser to the operating system (a good thing, as it turns out, considering the ineptness of their security team) and required them to pay at least lip service to interoperability. Considering the extent of their bad behavior, they got off extremely lightly.
Google, by contrast, even if it has a monopoly on the search engine market, doesn't have the ability to lock in users that Microsoft, the OS provider, could enforce. They've earned their enviable position by providing quality services, not by being the only game in town.
Google is basically a
Google is basically a spyware company. I avoid all Google but search. I'm used to using Google like most for search, but the few times I tried Bing the results were just as good as Google.
Google doesn't understand modularity.
Microsoft IS a monopoly
I will second dob: Microsoft is targeted because it has monopoly power and because of the way they abused and abuse this power. This results in higher prices, less choice and less innovation for the consumer.
In this instance, there is no barrier to integration. For one thing, MS does not have a monopoly in search. More importantly, it is not the concept of integration that was/is the problem: it is the concept of tying, where you have to buy one MS product if you use another.
These restrictions do not apply to Apple since they do not have monopoly power in their market. (MP3 players, maybe, but this is not a market that is susceptible to the economics of a Natural Monopoly, so it is much harder to show market power there.)
mcdruid, this is a
mcdruid, this is a frightening concept. What you are saying is that, if a company is successful competing in the marketplace and gains a large market share (despite the availability of alternatives and not through any government help), then the government can step in and force this company to make their products inferior to those of the competition (less integrated, for example).
Apple offers much more integration than Microsoft is allowed to and as a result is now gaining market share. Is this how governments are supposed to regulate free markets?
Note that Kevin's original quote was complaining "Why Microsoft hasn’t made their Windows platform more webby is beyond me". So they are damned if they do and damned if they don't.
Again, I have my own complaints about the design of many Microsoft products. But I find Microsoft's persecution by the government for its success in a competitive marketplace, and restricting it in making full use of current technologies, to be not right.
Basic Econ
JS, I specifically refered to Microsoft as a Natural Monopoly, a very old concept, dating back to Adam Smith, I believe. Microsoft trivially fits the definition of a Natural Monopoly, as even Bill Gates agrees. The concept of a natural monopoly suggests that it is not necessarily the company's talents and abilities that allow it to dominate a market, but it is a by-product of the market structure.
Essentially every economist in the country considers MS to be a monopoly, as well as the court systems of most major economies. In standard economics theory, a monopoly is considered a bad thing for the reasons I mentioned above.
Furthermore, MS has been found, by many different courts, of abusing its monopoly power by engaging in anti-competitive practices to undercut or eliminate competition and thus maintain higher prices and reduce innovation.
The government's right to regulate a company to increase competition is built on these basic economic principles and enshrined in the legal system (not just ours, but also those of the leading economic powers).
With respect to MS, the government has not forced them to "make their products inferior to those of the competition." What the governments (US and Europe) have done is mandated more openness (such as publishing APIs, for example), and to stop tying practices (such as forcing PC buyers to purchase Windows regardless of whether they wanted it).
The governments' actions in the case of Microsoft has the effect of lowering prices for the consumer and increasing innovation, competition and consumer choice.
Too much advertising
I've been spurred to try it out for a couple of days, and I think I'm going back to Google. I'll just note some points of difference.
First is the home-page advertising. Yes, I know that a search engine has to make money, but I didn't have in mind first seeing tacky offers (yesterday for Baltimore sports souvenirs, and I'm a New Yorker, today for belly dancing), tabloid headlines, and yes that photo. I feel like I've got grease all over my hands.
Second, the interface isn't as different as I expected. Say, when I experimented with a misspelling, where Google suggests an alternative spelling and gives the top two hits for it above hits for the wrong spelling, Bing integrates them. But no big deal either way. I could navigate and find advanced options for both. I must admit I don't like Bing's search button next to the text box. It misled me to click on it, which of course took me back to exactly where I was.
Third, quality of most searches is hard to generalize about. Google is mostly giving better results, but Kevin at least shows up at the top of Bing searches for him, while Google still has him third, after two links for his old Washington Monthly location.
Fourth, searches for goods (or via "shopping") definitely shows Microsoft's crassness. Google got me consistently cheaper and more balanced results, reserving its advertising biases for the right column. I felt like Bnig was shoving its advertisers down my throat.
If I may elaborate...
http://tinyurl.com/bingdrumjacko
Michael Mechanic is a senior editor at Mother Jones.
If I may elaborate...
http://tinyurl.com/bingdrumjacko
Michael Mechanic is a senior editor at Mother Jones.