Posted on 08/06/2009 9:47:07 AM PDT by antiRepublicrat
Just as Bing is gaining popularity, some disturbingly pro-Microsoft and anti-Apple search results rear their ugly heads.
Oh Microsoft, just when we were starting to believe in this thing called Bing, you go messing with the search results.
Case in point: a search on Bing for the phrase, "Why is Windows so expensive?" returned this as the top link....
"Why are Macs so expensive."
That's right. You're not hallucinating. That was the top response on Bing to a question about the price of Windows.
(Excerpt) Read more at advice.cio.com ...
I think people see what they want to see. At that, the result page I get on Bing from "Why is Windows So Expensive" has mostly pro-Mac articles or articles unrelated to OS.
I saw this posted over at slashdot.org. A lot of users pointed out that the results were similar (although in a different order) over on google.
I do find it somewhat humourous considering google selling search results to the highest advertiser.
The first result they show (which is actually my second result) is a Yahoo! answer result so by popularity, it is logical that would be high up.
My first result
Sponsored sitesWindows Help & Support- www.iyogi.net
Call 1-877-50-IYOGI (49644) to get Microsoft Windows Technical Support
News about Why is Windows so expensive
Amazon: Mac OS X 10.6 sells faster than Windows 7
... running Mac OS X 10.4, known as Tiger, must instead purchase the more expensive ... of Leopard! :-) Leopard is/was a… PC Advisor 1 day agoHow much is that clunker in the window?Los Angeles Times 1 day agoFrom the Right: How much is that clunker?Imperial Valley Press Online 10 hours agoSee today’s top stories · Create news alert
Pffft...a likely Google disinformaion campaign.
Google @ 25th
Why are Macs so expensive?Why are Macs so expensive? techradar.com — There are some good reasons not to ... If I feel like Sony are charging too much for a Laptop with Windows I can ...
digg.com/apple/Why_are_Macs_so_expensive - Cached - Similar
At the time that was at the top. Now it’s changed, whether by algorithm or MS backpedaling due to this story (you can see this story is now in the search results).
If memory serves me correctly, I believe Bing is a ‘smart’ search algorithm in that it learns your activity and tailors results to your history. If the person writing this article was a Mac fan and searched on that a lot, it may be the reason why the Mac article for him is pushed to the top but it isn’t for others.
See #9
I just searched over at Google and the top results referred to 1) the price of Windows, with one each of 2) vinyl windows and 3) this story.
Total BS.
Well, it’s not true. I googled the same query and every result on the first page was about Microsoft.
Go to Bing, and I got the same exact result..Macs were second.
No, the fact that it’s Yahoo Answers doesn’t explain it considering the question in the search is about Macs.
This was deliberate manipulation.
got the same result, and I have not used Bing once.
The Net Neutrality Bill should cover this.
other interesting result:
“The top responses to the “Is Microsoft Evil?” question were, get this, a link to a New York Times story about whether or not Google is considered evil, a link about proxy servers, and a link to a story about Microsoft being charitable. Wow.
But those results have magically changed. As of today (August 5) search results for these phrases actually seem uncensored. The random Manhattan link is still there, but it’s under three links about Microsoft Word. Not that the links are actually helpful, but open-ended questions are difficult in search engines. As for the “Is Microsoft Evil?” search, the Google story is now gone and all the current search results address the question at hand: “Is Microsoft Evil?”
Is Bing evil? Not yet. So far, I like its organized interface, but I’m finding its search results to be sloppy. Sloppy is one thing, but sloppy and censored? That’s when evil starts lurking. Keep it fair, Microsoft.
Monitor Bing yourself at this site that allows you to search on both Bing and Google simultaneously.”
At least Bing doesn’t get stuck searching. Most of the time I try a Google search it just goes into and endless loop until the second or third time I try it. What’s up with that? Bing is much faster for me, though Google does consistently produce more results, sometimes it finds things where Bing comes up empty.
Google separates the ads from the search results. In fact, right now Google has Bing ads up clearly marked as a "sponsored link" and separated from search results, plus the first search result for "bing" is Bing.
I hope not. This is simply about whether you can trust a company's search service, and the public will decide.
*sniff*
Sorry those OCD treatments aren’t working out for you.
I’ve noticed some Google slowness on IE. No conspiracy, IE just sucks. Google through the Firefox search box is very fast.
Microsoft does have a history of this. They manipulated the results some years back against Linux. A search for “Linux” returned Microsoft’s anti-Linux site among the top results, and results you’d think “Linux” would return were nowhere near the top.
That was corrected later but was reportedly what initially showed up. When I tried it, all results were matching Microsoft, however.
I use FF 3.5.2 so maybe there’s some kind of conflict with an add on. Weird.
In the madness of hundreds of birther threads, normally astute FReepers missed the introduction of Net Neutrality last week.
http://www.freepress.net/files/H.R.3458-7-31-09.pdf
‘‘(6) to guard against discriminatory favoritism
24 for, or degradation of, lawful content, applications,
25 or services by network operators based upon their
26 source, ownership, or destination on the Internet;”
Try Googling “Why is Google so evil?” (use that phrase exactly) and you’ll get a page of returns that talk about Google not being evil and Microsoft being evil.
Does this mean that Google is just as evil and shady as Microsoft?
A larger, high res version is available at the link.
I'm not seeing that. I am seeing some pretty big complaints against Google though. Of course, unlike Bing it didn't return "Why is Microsoft so evil?" as the top search result.
Interesting. Any law can be twisted, but you’d have to twist this pretty far because Microsoft is not showing favoritism based on “source, ownership, or destination,” but on content. Also in this capacity Microsoft is not in the role of network operator, but a content provider. This role is what net neutrality protects. IOW, Time Warner Cable can’t block or degrade access to Bing for its customers in a discriminatory manner because TWC penned a deal with Google for preferential treatment over Microsoft.
The first two ahead of the Mac result refer to this story. The screen shot I posted shows what it looked like before this story broke.
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