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Bing being merely as good as Google means the Bing team haven't done enough. That means they have to compete on brand, and that's really hard since Google has a
by whopa 17y ago
Bing being merely as good as Google means the Bing team haven't done enough. That means they have to compete on brand, and that's really hard since Google has a stronger brand. Yahoo's search results have been on par with Google for most people's purposes for a while, but that hasn't helped them.
To compete with Google on search you have to do to Google what Google did to AltaVista: be noticeably better, consistently. As you said, Google is nowhere near good enough yet.
So this is what Google is scared of, and that's why it's in their best interest to keep innovating, because otherwise someone somewhere might beat them to the next real breakthrough.
Bing so far has failed by not making any real technical progress, and only reaching parity. That means right now they have to compete on brand, and that sucks for them.
- MikeCapone 17y agoExactly! Thank Cthulhu for competition.
- waterlesscloud 17y agoIt sucks for Google too. The very last thing they want is the commoditization of search. Resisting brand advertising is likely a result of wanting to limit the perception of being a commodity. They'd MUCH rather have the perception that they don't need to compete on brand, that they're technically much better than everyone else. The fact that they're doing lifestyle branding is actually a pretty bad sign. It means they feel Bing represents a real threat. Lucky for Google, Microsoft sucks at advertising. Imagine if they had to compete with someone who was as good at lifestyle branding as Coca-Cola.