Facebook serving Bing search results? Impact on Google?

[onebuyone]

I don't use Facebook every day, but yesterday I noticed strange thing. I typed something in search box(like "blue widgets") and below first few facebook results(some random people) I saw 4-5 Bing results, almost exactly the same which I got when searching directly @bing.com.

Today I don't see it for same phrase, so I guess it's some kind of A/B testing going on.

I'm sure I didn't see this kind of stuff few months ago.

What does it mean for Google?

[Robert Charlton]

Here are two old threads tracing the progression...

Facebook search to be powered by Bing
Feb 7, 2010
http://www.webmasterworld.com/msn_microsoft_search/4075876.htm [webmasterworld.com]

Bing results now showing on Facebook
Jun 19, 2010
http://www.webmasterworld.com/msn_microsoft_search/4155400.htm [webmasterworld.com]

So, FB and Bing have been at this for a while. Since I don't use Facebook search to search the web, I can't comment on whether you're seeing a recent change. It would most likely, though, be affecting Facebook search more than Bing search, since you'd already been observing the Bing results on Bing. ;)

What does it mean for Google?

In terms of search results on Google, which is what we discuss in this forum, it most probably means that Google results, if they are personalized by social and demographic data (of the kind Facebook/Bing already have), will have to get that data from other sources. This undoubtedly was a strong motivator for Google's integration of its services and the launching of Google+.