Attractive and accurate, the redesign of Microsoft's search engine should make Google nervous.
I never thought the day would come when I would say to myself, "Wow, Bing is great!" Well, I was wrong. The day has come.
The redesign of Microsoft's search engine is quite stunning with its new three-column layout. For one thing, it polishes the presentation of the results so there are logical sub-categories covered on the first page. This is far superior to a linear list. It rolled out to the US market today.
Google toys with this thinking with its Images search results, which appear on the first page. Microsoft took this idea and extended it by completely reorganizing the presentation of these "hints" for future exploration.
I used to use a long forgotten search engine that presented structured results like this and loved it. There have since been other similar attempts, including the now defunct cuil.com. Cuil got a lot of early attention but its "misspelled" name (meant to be pronounced like "cool") probably did not help. It was experimenting with these sorts of designs and was getting somewhere until someone killed the whole thing.
I would say that Bing is now the leader in this pursuit.
And how are the results of the search? Excellent, plain and simple. I have routine searches I like to do to test these things and it performed as well or better than Google, with an organizational edge over Google.
Like many writers who have a strong Web presence, I also do the normal vanity searches on my name. The results could not be any better. I also do a routine search for one of my podcasts, No Agenda, by simply typing in "no agenda." It's a unique show name, which tends to dominate results but could result in a mess. But no, everything was as it should be with one minor exception.
Well, that's the good news. Now here is the bad news.
Google could easily take one look at this new presentation model and copy it. Would it take a week? A month? A day?
I cannot see how Google can stay with its old layout after using this product. If Google does not take action, it will lose serious market share once people see this and begin to use it. If Google acts fast enough, it can match or beat this layout before too many people notice that Microsoft first popularized it.
In the meantime, take a look at the new Bing and see what you think. I'll have to use it exclusively for a while to see if it can become my go-to search engine. It sure is efficient.
My only qualm about it is the fact that this wasn't promoted by Microsoft. I only heard of it from a news item. Did the PR folks send emails? I didn't get one. Did anyone? I'm not seeing a lot of ink about this. Is there a TV commercial? Was there a re-birth announcement?
On the Microsoft homepage, there is not a single mention of this development. It pushes Windows 8, IE, the new Xbox, and even the Nokia Lumia 900. But not this. It makes you wonder. The company remains as baffling as ever.
You can Follow John C. Dvorak on Twitter @therealdvorak.
More John C. Dvorak:
• The New Bing is Indeed Great
• Go Get Windows 8
• What Happened to Productivity?
• Microsoft Should Not Buy Nokia
• Egan's Twitter Book is a Fail Whale
• more
Go off-topic with John C. Dvorak.
