Bonum Certa Men Certa

From Live Search to Dead Search (aka “Bing”)

Sinking



Summary: Microsoft's renamed engine drops to oblivion shortly after its launch

ACCORDING to this new report, Microsoft's biased and potentially law-breaking search/decisions engine [1, 2, 3, 4, 5] is reaching the end of the road quite so soon, despite approximately $100 million in marketing.



To Microsoft, the online business is crucial for survival as debt comes knocking on the door. Here is the latest Mirosoft investor who seemingly loses hopes:

We've owned shares of Microsoft (MSFT) for almost seven years -- with nothing to show for it. I've been wrong on the stock, and something is wrong at the company. What is it?

[...]

It appears to me, however, that the wide variety of options presented by the internet makes it a much harder beast to control through monopolistic practices. Switching from one website to another is effortless. Most publishing now happens online, so proprietary formatting is gone. As a writer, I used to have to worry constantly about whether the format of my documents would carry over to the recipient. Not anymore. Almost everything is plain text anyway, or rich text, and both of those work anywhere. Blink! Just like that, compatibility with Word disappeared as a reason to keep paying money to Microsoft.

[...]

Exhibit one is the new Microsoft Bing. Have you seen it yet? It's the company's latest attempt to gain market share in internet search, where it just can't get any traction. Its inability to make headway in online search shows that it's stuck with the desktop, the very real estate that's declining in relative value because people spend less time there than before. Nobody is going to stop Googling stuff in favor of Binging it.

It's so lopsided online that Yahoo (YHOO) isn't interested in doing any kind of deal with Microsoft. Remember a little over a year ago when Microsoft tried to buy Yahoo, and Yahoo snubbed it? That's still going on. Yahoo feels more confident in its battle against Google (GOOG) without Microsoft on its side. Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz said last week at Bank of America's 2009 Merrill Lynch tech conference, "I personally think we would be better off if we never heard the word Microsoft." That's a pretty clear repudiation.

Bing is a convenient case-in-point for what ails Microsoft. It calls itself a "decision engine," which is already lame. When I search online, I'm no more making decisions than when I drive my car and "decide" at an intersection whether to turn or keep going straight. Sure, life is a series of decisions, but what I'm doing online with search is searching. I may be finding information to help me make a decision, but the main thing I'm doing is searching. So, already, the attempt to differentiate falls flat.

Beyond that, Bing is no better at helping me make decisions than the search results at Google and Yahoo. Besides, its real game becomes clear with its focus on buying things and enticing me with its garish cashback feature. That part is inelegant and transparently against my interests. Cashback pops up from the most expensive options, and tempts me to get a 5% rebate by paying 25% more on the price. This is straight from the playbook of discredit cards and the worst retail practices. Once I wised up to cash-back being a con from Redmond, the entire set of search results from Bing became suspect. If it's skewing the shopping results toward expensive items so it has a profit margin that enables it to give me 5% back and still retain a slice for itself, why wouldn't it skew search results in some way?

[...]

Disclosure: Author owns MSFT shares.


When more investors lose faith, they'll take their money elsewhere. This leaves Microsoft less capable of operating without more loans.

"I'm going to f---ing bury that guy, I have done it before, and I will do it again. I'm going to f---ing kill Google."

--Steve Ballmer, Microsoft CEO



Comments

Recent Techrights' Posts

Our Three Lawsuits Against Microsofters Are About to Become a Lot More Relevant to GNU/Linux
The Master will easily understand why Garrett has been attacking me since 2012
They Don't Tell Us that 'Digitalisation' (Now Sold as "Hey Hi") Just Means Customers Become Unpaid Staff and Are Made Accountable
People are being conditioned to associate technology with something undesirable, at times even unbearable
 
New and Old
On Ageism in Tech
Slop Is Not Intelligence and It Does Not Enhance Productivity
Like voice dictation, which cannot tell the difference between "sheet" and "shit"
EPO Crimes Are Spreading to the British Court System
Society is now paying the price for failing to tackle crimes at the EPO
It's Time to Dump SharePoint and Here's What to Use Instead
Nextcloud, ownCloud, Bookstack, MediaWiki, and MediaGoblin
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, July 22, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, July 22, 2025
Brett Wilson LLP Has Gone Silent
Sometimes silence says more than nothing at all
Slopwatch: LinuxSecurity, Planet Ubuntu, and LinuxTechLab
some slopfarms show no remorse and they don't value their reputation at all
Links 23/07/2025: Book Bans, Storms, and Kangaroo Court for Patents Commits More Unlawful Acts of Overreach
Links for the day
Gemini Links 22/07/2025: Thinkpad and Pinephone
Links for the day
Links 22/07/2025: "Blog Restart" and Microsoft Clobbered by “ToolShell"
Links for the day
Global Warming and Global GAFAM Energy-Wasting
Burn more money (borrowed, loans), then hope the waste will somehow translate into profit?
No Compliance With the European Patent Convention (EPC) at the European Patent Office (EPO)
It's about preventing competition against this autocracy
Blue-Collar Trolls vs White-Collar Trolls
Examples of white-collar trolls
Apple Vision Pro Failed So Badly That Its Sales Are About 2,000 Times Smaller Than iPhone Sales
What's left for Apple to offer other than hype?
To Millions of People "Year of the Linux Desktop" Was Some Time in the 1990s (Bootable GNU/Linux as a Complete Operating System is Over 33 in Age)
In some sense, "year of the Linux desktop" was 33 years ago
Make No Assumptions (or Demands) About the Screen Resolution Used by Other People
There are usability aspects, aside from accessibility aspects
Why Wayland (and XWayland) Won't Solve the Key Problem It Proclaims to be Tackling (the Same Is True for Rust)
The problem isn't Wayland per se but the false promises and efforts to force everybody to move to it whilst insulting or demonising everyone who won't play along
Diplomatic Immunity Should Not Exist for Anybody
The EPO in its current form gradually 'normalises' the end of European democracy
Brett Wilson LLP Stopped Sending Me Papers When I Showed It had Sent Me Over 5 Kilograms of Legal Papers
A week ago we lodged our third lawsuit
Microsoft Mass Layoffs and Shutdowns Became the New Normal at Microsoft
Microsoft mass layoffs became a topic of everyday media coverage since May
Amazon Web Services (AWS) Has Layoffs and Microsoft Gaming/Entertainment Division Has an Uncertain Future
it's good to see all those horrible things crashing and burning
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, July 21, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, July 21, 2025
FSF "Raised Almost $139,000 During This Summer Campaign"
"Thank you for making a stand against dystopia!"
Gemini Links 22/07/2025: VPS Exploited and Fear of View
Links for the day
LLM Bots vs Techrights
Slows things down a bit
New Publication Sheds Lights on Abuse of Workers at the European Patent Office (EPO)
Put in simple terms, they're killing the Office, harming remaining staff, try to hire rubber-stampers
Links 21/07/2025: Hardware, Health, and Imperialism
Links for the day
Gemini Links 21/07/2025: "When Buying Isn't Owning" and "CMS Special Edition"
Links for the day
Links 21/07/2025: Indie Web and Toxic Politics
Links for the day
[Meme] Microsoft Lawyers Throwing Stones in Glass Houses
threatened me with bankruptcy
Google "AI Overview" is Not AI and Not Overview
do not be misled; what Google does isn't smart, it's just ripping off the sites it already crawled for as long as 27 years
Making the Case to Dump Microsoft and GAFAM for National and Digital Sovereignty
"Sovereignty is difficult"
The Tactics of the Opposition (Microsoft Lunduke): Associate With K00ks, Throw in Vaccines to Muddy the Water
Who stands to gain from this?
Europe's Second-Largest Institution (EPO) and Largest Patent Monopoly Office Needs More Transparency, Not Less Transparency
In the EPO, what good are elections when one candidate literally bribes all the voters?
How Not to Report News About Microsoft
This pattern of misreporting is so widespread that it's hard to believe it's not intentional
Computer Science is Under Attack, They Want Everyone to be a Consumer
If people can no longer acquire Computer Science education and real Computer Science experience, they will not know how to control their own digital destiny or emancipate the very same universities that now control the syllabus and instead of teaching Computer Science encourage the outsourcing of systems
The Best Tools Are the Simplest Tools
There's a hidden message here about the merits of sticking with X
Ofcom Online Safety Group Speaks of Protecting Women Online, Will Brett Wilson LLP Ever Listen?
They've essentially became like the Taliban's "burka police"
Social Control Media Relies on Advertisers, So It'll Always Be Hostile Towards Free Software
Sales, sales, sales
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, July 20, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, July 20, 2025
Fragmentation of Data
Life is too short to "hoard" data
In Defence of "Spinning Rust"
Just because something is "old" (or older) doesn't mean it ought to become extinct
Using Free Software to Prepare Legal Documents
LibreOffice is openly complaining about OOXML as an obstacle
Tech and Technology Are Not the Same Anymore
"Are you into tech, Sir?"
Our Articles About SLAPPs Receive Recognition and Interest
This week we shall continue writing about the 3 lawsuits we filed