Some of you who love Google Maps might know about its street view feature. Microsoft has actually trumped Google with its new Bing Maps features. Not only does it have its own cameras taking photographs of selected places but has also introduced crowd sourcing. Crowd sourcing means the videos or photos you take and post of Flickr can be used against Bing photographs in a seamless way.
First time I used Bing Maps I felt it was a clone of Google Maps but I was impressed with some of their seamless products. The current new products are mainly creating a 3 D environment of whole cities. This is available with Google Earth but for Google Earth you need to install a software which uses a graphics card.
Bing Maps creating a 3D environment is similar to Google Maps and hence you need only a browser rather than a software installed for that 3 D rendering.
There are many features like historical timeline and before and after views which show streets on how they have changed over time. I think these features are a lot more important as an archive than just a mere travel tool.
Here is a video of TED talk which introduced the new features of Bing Maps.
I think Bing Maps and their new features if they get them to work right will be truly difficult to compete against but I am sure Google Maps will have something up its sleeve.
So what do you think about Bing Maps? Will it bury Google Maps and its relevance?
This one is not really a serious analysis of Google and Bing. It is neither a serious discussion about what these two search engines think about it. But I guess sometimes the truth seems to spill out unknowingly. Richie has published a funny post on what does Google think about other websites. Here I bring to your what does Google and Bing think about each other.
Google Search has a feature called Search Suggestions which drop down suggestions as you type in a query. Now Bing also comes with search suggestions.
What does Google think of Bing?
What does Bing think of Google?
Hope you liked it and now let me know what you think about it?
If Google is the undisputed king of the search engines then Bing is the challenger to the crown. I do not think at the moment Bing is mounting much of a challenge but realistically it is the only one which can compete over the years with Google. For people who love looking up stuff with search might enjoy this one. A website which gives you search results on Bing and Google side by side on the same page.
Very aptly it is called Bingle and seems like a very handy tool for people trying to look up results from a SEO point of view.
Bingle allowed me to check Bing and Google results side by side not just when it came to web search but I could also compare image search results along with maps being searched for with Google and Bing separately on the same page.
I won’t say it is a great way to look up a particular information but it is quite awesome to carry out the same searches on both engines and look up side by side which link it rates as more important compared to the other.
Often when you look at a search engine you might not be able to make sense of it but with a comparative look-up of search queries can give you an insight into what exactly that search engines gives a higher preference to.
Go ahead and try Bingle and let me know your views by dropping in your comments.
Most times when we use search we do not need to use the Advanced Search options on any search engine. This is especially true for people looking to buy something online. But very often we end up using advanced search options for getting exact information which sometimes can be called niche.
Searchzooka is one such website which allows you to carry out advanced search using various search engines on the internet which includes Google, Bing, Yahoo, Ask, Digg, Technorati and Del.icio.us. What’s more is that you can save these results like a list.
As you can see in the image above, I searched for Devils Workshop. It gave me relevant search details with Google, Bing, Yahoo, Ask, Digg, Technorati and Del.icio.us. There is no need to register or sign up to save the search. It gets automatically saved with the help of cookies.
In case you clear the cookies or change your computer you can recover the advances search but using a recovery key.
I could also search by relevance or by date.
The search criteria can really be tweaked a lot. I can specify particular date line to search within. I could also specify the search within a particular top level domain like .net, .org and .com.
There is also an option to search for files with the search engines. If a particular engine does not support the particular feature it gives results which are default.
I could also keep my search query be looked up anywhere on the net or even in specific page titles and URLs.
I think this website is a great tool to carry out research of a subject using various search engines. Often when we search we do not find something we want and we end up using another search engine. The need for this is removed with searchzooka doing this in one go and hence saving a lot of time.
Try it out and let me know what you think about SearchZooka through your comments.
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No, this article is not about Artificial Intelligence making it’s way to the internet but about a website which tries to give you an opinion on what the internet thinks about a certain keyword using search results. The great thing about these search results are it mixes search results form Google Search, Yahoo search and Bing.
This is fun and interesting way to look up how a particular issue or topic is viewed positively and negatively across the search spectrum.
“What does the Internet think?“ is a website which tries to analyse a search keyword from three points of views. They are positive, negative and indifferent.
The implications are quite interesting. This does not take into account how popular the search keyword is but if opinions are positive or negative towards that keyword.
For example if I searched for ‘Open Source‘ with Google the results were overwhelmingly positive whereas when I searched the same with Bing the negative and positive percentage were almost equal.
This means that people using different search engines have different views and opinions on one particular subject. This website is a great way to get a straw poll of those different views. For instance if you are a blogger and a majority of your traffic comes from Bing, you might want to tone down your criticism of Microsoft’s products or softwares which are not open source.
That said I do not think that if you are blogger, using this tool will help you optimize your website’s listing on a search engine. It is only a rough guide or indicative poll.
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Bing has signed a deal with News Corp which gives them access to their content. It should not be really all that important except that News Corp only a few weeks ago had sent out feelers that they were about to de-list their websites from Google Search. This will probably start another round of the competition between Google and Bing.
Google vs Bing
Bing has signed up a deal with News Corp and will be paying for exclusive material from their newspapers and journals. This most definitely means News Corp will de-list their website from Google search in return. What does it really imply? It implies that you cannot search for News Corp content using Google.
This might in a way force Google do to the same, that is pay for news content and hence in the long run hurt their profits. Will Google follow Bing? I doubt it will. The loser in this case can be News Corp, who will have it’s website content show up only to people using Bing and no visitors will be directed from Google.
Finally Google does not make any money from Google News so this would not really dent Google at all.
Blogs and Tweets
Some news companies do have legitimate concerns because if their content is free to view it can also end up being copied by bloggers which in a way will finally hurt original creators of the content.
What if their interpretation is different? Most respectable bloggers would never really copy material online. But if something that is news worthy will be commented upon and sometimes a alternative viewpoint presented.
Even if News Corp is not listed on Google, it can still end up being on Google Search engine in the form of references by tweets and blog articles.
Who really owns the News?
The question is really debatable. Can a company lay claim to an event that happens in the public domain. I think that the way forward for news content providers would be to monetize their websites by having visitors and show them advertisements. This is done by many news providers anyways.
To expect people to pay for subscription is something that will probably not work. People are not really going to pay for content which they get for free somewhere else. For example you can gets access to news from a ‘tweet’ on Twitter. It does not even need a Search Engine to get the word around now a days.
What do you think about this latest ongoing tussle between Bing and Google. Will the ultimate loser be Bing or Google? Or will it be News Corp? Let me know through your comments.
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Google has announced a a new web tool called Image Swirl. It allows a user to search for similar images with the functionalities of Wonder Wheel. We had reviewed Wonder Wheel over two months ago and found it quite useful especially if while searching for something, one search leads to another and you want to backtrack to what you were originally looking up.
With Image Swirl I think Google is making their image search look cooler and also has raised the bar for their competition which is Bing’s image search.
Google’s Image Swirl
As you can see in the image above, I searched for ‘Taj Mahal‘. First it pulled up a host of images for the monument. I liked a sketch of the Taj Mahal and clicked on it.
This opened another circle which had more sketches. I clicked on another one which shows similar yet different types of sketches.
Image Swirl is useful for looking up similar images the same way users might look for similar information or links while using search features like Wonder Wheel. A simple click to the previous circle means I am back to where I began in the first place.
The Bing Effect
I used Bing’s image search and it also has a option to look for similar images (see image above). If I needed to compare these two, I would say Bing search was far more complete and comprehensive when it came to looking for similar images. But then Google’s Image Swirl is still quite new and it should be much improved over the days.
Try out Google Image Swirl and let me know your opinions through your comments.
Win $100 Every Month in “Blogger of The Month” Award
Almost everyone who is reading this must have read about Google Maps and used its functionalities and features. So I was a little curious to see what exactly did Bing Maps bring to the table. Obviously Bing is trying capture peoples attention and rival Google which is not easy. But a casual look at Bing Maps was quite surprising and I found Bing Maps more or less resembled a clone of Google Maps.
Below I am comparing a few features about Bing Maps and Google Maps to show how they are so similar you might mistake one for the other. Bing Maps is still a beta product and has had many recent updates. I did not expect a lot from it was quite surprised how accurate and detailed it was.
Get Directions
One of the first thing that is similar is when you look at getting directions. Look at the image below and see how similar are the two.
I did a search for directions to drive around in Pune, India between two points. The search were the same on Bing Maps and Google Maps.
I expected Bing Maps to show a lot less of Pune, as I thought being a new it might have a lot less detail about Pune being a non-US city but that was not the case at all.
Both returns were accurate and detailed. The appearance of maps, directions and waypoints were eerily similar. At one point I was actually confused if I was using Google Maps or Bing Maps.
Even the satellite mode of Google Maps is available in Bing Maps as Aerial mode. The options to send and share maps over email are present in both in almost similar ways.
Many people have added their business locations on Google Maps but that is not the same with Bing Maps and that could be issue at first. I guess in time people might start listing their business addresses on Bing Maps in bigger numbers.
Try out Bing Maps and see if they compare with Google Maps. I still wonder if Microsoft with Bing Maps is indirectly telling us that Google Maps is so perfect they had to copy it function to function. Bing Maps in the form of Live Maps has been around for a while but recent additions have made it a lot like Google Maps. :-P
The MSN homepage will be undergoing some changes very soon. This won’t be just restricted to its style and format but also will have some added functionality. I looked it up on the Bing blog which made the announcement. I used the preview version of MSN homepage which will be available by next year.
The Old and the New
New Version (preview)
The new version seems to be distinctly white and a lot less blue which has been the hallmark of the MSN homepage for over 10 years now. Also the logo looks different and minimalistic.
The new version looked a lot less customizable but that is probably because it is still in preview mode and hence might not have all the functionalities.
From the homepage I can access a feed from Hotmail. That is not a novelty as I can do that with the old version too, but the new one allows me to get feeds from social networks like Windows Live, Facebook and Twitter.
I also found that Bing search has been integrated in a more wholesome way. The information with Bing search results will take into account the zip code you are living in. This will be a way to localize search content. MSN has had success with this by localizing weather and news updates by using the zip code of the person logged into the homepage.
Soon to be Old Version
Comparing the two, it is obvious that MSN is trying clean up it’s act and prefers to let people explore the website rather than bombarding them with information.
Bing and Twitter have reached a deal and Twitter will now allow Bing to use tweets used in the open for search results. This is a way to look up what is being discussed on Twitter about a particular issue in real time. I decided to use Bing Twitter which still is a demo only available for users in US.
As I tried Bing Twitter, it was quite impressed with the idea. This was one great way to get current Tweets about news items or even checking on the latest instance when your website or profile was mentioned. I searched for “Devilsworkshop”. Immediately it showed up the latest tweets with the word ‘devilsworkshop’ figuring in them.
Bing Twitter
The moment you search on Bing Twitter it shows 4-5 links to the ‘Most recent Tweets’. This seems to be real time as there is a play and pause button.
Below the Recent Tweets section is Top links shared in Tweets. This seems to be where you can search Twitter more deeper and not just have access to tweets that are only recent.
The search seems to be very interesting and because Twitter itself is looking to share this data with Bing, it seems this will be quite a potent way to follow latest views and opinions on events happening.
The deal between Bing and Twitter is non-exclusive. So I guess Twitter is free to have a similar deal with Google search.
Google Trends is a public tool which displays fastest rising search queries on Google allowing marketeers to check on what are the latest trends on its search engines. The trends are classified as how often a particular search is entered relative to the total search volume across various regions of the world. This gives someone visiting www.google.com/trends updated information on what people are looking for on Google and also how new information is impacting its popularity.
Initially trends were not updated on Google on a regular basis. Often trends were updated after bloggers wrote about it in a critical way. Now a days Google claims to update its Hot Trends page on a hourly basis.
Bing Search is managed by Microsoft and was known formerly as Live Search. Bing! has been in the news lately for striking a deal with Yahoo and it will also power Yahoo Search. Bing has made many improvements to its search options and also for the first time categorising search results. Bing search result’s history is not as mature as Google Search History but it allows access to the search history or time line without needing for a user to sign in, unlike Google where the user needs to sign in.
Trendy!Bing is a combination of Google Trends and Microsoft’s Bing Search results. On visiting the website it claims to be the place where Google trends meets Bing results. The homepage shows two categories one is Hot Trends for the current day and the fastest rising trends. Click of one of the trends you get to see them as results in Bing Search. Its basically a cross referenced way of searching what is most searched on Google using Bing. The site is still in beta and it would expectedly add more online tools for people interested in search trends.
Like in the month of June, Bing continues to make slow but steady progress reveals July reports. According to comScore Global Stats analysis, search engine Bing once again increased the Microsoft share of the US search market in July. Although the growth is minor from 8.23 % in June to 9.41 % in July, Microsoft will sure be happy to see the progress. Google continues to dominate the US search market quite easily with 77.54% in July, down from 78.48 % in June. This is despite Microsoft and Yahoo competition combined with 20.36% of the market, a slight increase from 19.27 % in June.
On the global front, Microsoft and Yahoo combined took 8.77 % of the global search market in July (8.45% in June). Google still dominates the search market globally with 89.23% in July (89.80% in June).
US Search Market
June 2009
July 2009
Bing *
8.23%
9.41%
Yahoo!
11.04%
10.95%
Bing * & Yahoo Combined
19.27%
20.36%
Google
78.48%
77.54%
* In June, the market share figure includes MSN Search and Live Search
Looks like there is no stopping for Bing. It has, since its launch, consistently been showing positive growth. Share your comments on what you think.
Bing is the most reviewed and discussed software of this year.It has been filled in news before it’s launching itself. Now it is one of the most used search engine and powerful opponent to even the giant Google. I think I don’t want to tell you that number peoples are using this search engine. Just think if you can get huge traffic from it. Interesting, isn’t it ? But don’t just dream that Bing will simply send visitors to your blog. You have to optimize your blog for Bing, then only you can get visitors from Bing. Anyway, No one has got that in what criteria Bing is ranking websites. But there are some little little tips we got about Bing. I have listed the TOP 7 – which have been approved by the whole web, in one voice.
1. Keywords In Domain
It’s heard that Bing is giving great importance to the keywords that are present in the domain name itself. So, bear this in mind while buying a new domain.
2. Age of your Domain
It’s approved that Bing is having more attraction towards old links. So try to buy an old domain, instead of registering a new one and being marked as a baby.
3. Size of the Content
Bing gives a great importance to pages with huge contents. A post with a 600 words could surely drive you a lot of traffic overnight.
4. Backlinks
Just as Google, Bing also use backlinks to measure your blog. Bing also gives a great importance to quality links. A good link could give you great authority than 100 bad links. Also bear in mind that bad links could effect your Bing rankings negatively.
5. Anchor Text
It seems like that Bing is having an eye on your anchor text too. So, don’t forget to use your killer keywords as your anchor text.
6. Page Title
In this case also, Bing shows similarity to Google. They are giving great importance to the page titles and the keywords in it.
7. Internal Links
Rather than counting the number of words, Bing is using the internal links on your site to calculate your keyword density. So don’t forget to give a link when you highlight your keywords.
There are so many other tips too, but these are the most useful and working tips. All these are simple and with these simple changes, you will be getting huge traffic !!! Isn’t it Interesting ?
So, make these changes on your blog, today itself. Enjoy……!!
[Editor's Note: This post is submitted by our guest blogger Rajeel KP or 'Reji'. Rajeel is a teen blogger who writes at Labofweb on stuff related to the Internet, blogging, useful sites, utilities, tech news, blogger templates, etc.
Here is a convenient search solution for all those confused between making a choice between Google, Yahoo or Bing. It’s good to have more options as an end user, but at the same time, more options mean having to pick out and choose from the alternatives when you actually need to use it. No one in today’s world has the time to run the same search on different search engines. That’s why you now have the option to fuse your searches together with FusionSearch!
Technology used
FusionSearch uses:
Pre-caching technology so that it can hit the desired speed when switching between pages.
AJAX technology for stability and reliability.
Information directly from Google, Bing and Yahoo indexes.
Sites providing similar services
A couple of days back, I wrote about a similar tool called AskBoth.com that lets you run a twin search, coupling Google and Bing. This means, that while searching for information, you can search on both the search engines at the same time.
Comparison
The advantage FusionSearch has over AskBoth is that it includes Yahoo search as well. However, the disadvantage is that it does not have the Image search option. Askboth.com on the other hand, has the regular features of Content Search on the Web as well as Image Search.
Check it out for yourself to see whether or not it gives you a better and faster search experience overall.
Should I try Microsoft’s beautiful search engine – Bing? Or should I stick to my all time favorite – Google? Torn between the two? In case you are, not to worry, now you have the option to ask them both together!
Askboth.com is a new web 2.0 twin search engine for you, coupled with Google as well as Bing, keeping all that confusion at bay. This means, you can now easily search for information on both the search engines at the same time.
Askboth.com has the regular features of Content Search on the Web as well as Image Search. This can also work as a SEO tool for you to compare the results on both the sites. You could even add it to your browser as your default search engine.
So, all those who laid eyes on Bing and just couldn’t get enough, but also couldn’t let go of old pal Google, this seems like an appealing option.
Although Google still dominates the US and global search market, Bing seems to have made some progress lately. Although it is still behind Yahoo search, but Bing has increases Microsoft’s share of search market by 1% in the US as per the analysis done by StatCounter in June.
Highlights from the June StatCounter report
US Stats
Microsoft had 8.23% of the search market
Yahoo had 11.04%. of the search market
Google continued to dominate the US market but slightly fell back from 79.07% in April to 78.48% in June.
Although a 1% increase in market share is not a huge return on the investment Microsoft has made, but the trends still appear quite positive for Microsoft’s new search engine.
Take a look at Microsoft’s market share for May/June in the US:
18th to 24th May: 7.41%
25th to 31st May: 9.11%
1st to 7th June: 9.21%
8th to 14th June: 7.47%
14th to 21st June: 7.6%
22nd to 28th June: 8.45%
Global Stats
Reports globally reveal that:
Microsoft, from 3.08% in April has reached to 3.30% in June.
Yahoo, in the same period, has fallen from 5.48% to 5.15%.
Google continues to dominate the global market with 89.80%.
If you’re a bit of a geek, and use the Firefox browser, you can already add Twitter search results to both Bing and Google via Greasemonkey. But it’s pretty rudimentary, just a list of the five most recent Twitter search results for that particular query pasted atop the regular results. Now, in a nod to the (so called) increasing importance of real-time search, Microsoft has started adding Twitter updates to its Bing search engine. For now, the Twitter-related results are limited only to searches on prominent Twitterers themselves. You can read more on this on Swati’s post on the same.
But wait a minute, isn’t Google already offering much more realtime search results?
For instance, try searching CISCO on Google and the engine will give a live stock quote too. Try searching USD to INR for the latest conversion rate. Apart from this, Google’s Blog Search crawls blogs almost every 15 mins. Bing has just done to microblogging what Google did to Blogging two years ago Nonetheless, am sure Google will soon implement this and may be throughout all twitter accounts.
I may have been a bit too heavy on Bing and that’s because I am completely sold out Google’s ‘Do No Evil’ stand. Let me know what’s your take on this.
[Editor's Note: This post is submitted by our guest blogger Akshay Raje. Akshay is a self thought freelance web designer and developer, loves to travel and is a great movie buff too. Web.D is about his projects and experiments with web technologies.
Hoping to get whip hand in the real-time search war, Microsoft’s Bing search engine is now including the popular Twitter users in its search results. Users just have to search on their name with the word “Twitter” added to it, and Bing will show Twitter results of the celebrities. Twitter results will be updated on Bing every 60 seconds.
Initially, Bing has selected some thousand prominent Twitterers from different domains. The selection was based on the number of followers and the volume of tweets they produce.
Bing will use Twitter’s public API to display those results in a special box among the other search results, such as stories that a person might have written about Twitter.
How does it work?
Just search for some of these names with the word Twitter. For instance: “Ryan Seacrest Twitter” or “Ryan Seacrest Tweets” or even “@ryanseacrest”
You’ll see their latest Tweets show up in real time on Bing’s search results like
Person’s latest Tweets
A link to “See more tweets” from that individual
Unlike other search engines, Bing will display multiple tweets within a single defined box, a search for say “Kara Swisher Twitter.”
Bing happens to be the first major search engine to integrate with Twitter in this way. Hopefully this move would keep the buzz alive.
I’m very curious as to how many Linux users are using Microsoft’s Bing Search Engine. I’ve used it twice while working on someone’s laptop. It wasn’t a bad experience. Bing delivered the information that I needed.
I think I don’t want to tell you that number peoples are using this search engine. Just think if you can get huge traffic from it. Interesting, isn’t it ? But don’t just dream that Bing will simply send visitors to your blog. You have to optimize your blog for Bing, then only you can get visitors from Bing. Anyway, No one has got that in what criteria Bing is ranking websites. But there are some little little tips we got about Bing. I have listed the TOP 7 – which have been approved by the whole web, in one voice.
Here is a convenient search solution for all those confused between making a choice between Google, Yahoo or Bing. It’s good to have more options as an end user, but at the same time, more options mean having to pick out and choose from the alternatives when you actually need to use it. No one in today’s world has the time to run the same search on different search engines. That’s why you now have the option to fuse your searches together with 
Should I try Microsoft’s beautiful search engine – Bing? Or should I stick to my all time favorite – Google? Torn between the two? In case you are, not to worry, now you have the option to ask them both together!
Although Google still dominates the US and global search market, Bing seems to have made some progress lately. Although it is still behind 
If you’re a bit of a geek, and use the Firefox browser, you can already add Twitter search results to both 
Hoping to get whip hand in the real-time search war, Microsoft’s Bing search engine is now including the popular Twitter users in its search results. Users just have to search on their name with the word “Twitter” added to it, and Bing will show Twitter results of the celebrities. Twitter results will be updated on Bing every 60 seconds.