New MSN Search is LIVE

We are seeing a rollout of MSN new search

[drdsl2000]

continued from: [webmasterworld.com...]

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It looks like it might be tied into their lateset Windows update.

Results look very good so far, Look out Google!

AND THERE WAS THREE

The Dr

[eyezshine]

I use mod_rewrite on a couple sites and MSN sucks down those pages like they're candy.

[quotations]

I don't think any of us are qualified to speculate accurately on how this will affect Google.

Some of us are.

Others are not.

[Tigrou]

95% of search engine users will have no clue and will continue to use Google.

- by internetheaven

internetheaven, I used to agree with you, but my eyes have been opened. It's not just us techies, but average person DOES notice (can notice?) that google results are getting worse.

Couple that with a MS-backed marketing campaign and you'll see migration. Not the downfall of Google, but certainly competition.

CF

[Tigrou]

BTW, contact in Belgium saw the beta traffic live, but with the alternate algo. (The spammier one).

For the past 3 weeks I've noticed that MSN was alternating between 2 different main algos,(or at least SERPs) so probably A/B testing now live.

CF

[willybfriendly]

FWIW, I have yet to see the beta show here in the PNW. Have looked in Opera, Firefox and IE.

Will this effect G? Hard to say. I see an awful lot of people do their searches from the browser address bar. For all those IE users that will be an MSN search. I suppose if it meets their needs they won't go any further.

WBF

[sachac]

Seeing beta results here in Trinidad. Not perfect but fresh. All five websites doing doing amazingly well, #1 for my single category keyword on one site and #5 for another, both in 10 million plus results.

Shows that good old fashion optimizing still works and also the extent to which Google and Yahoo mess around with their results.

[CathyM]

I am consistently seeing the Beta results live in California and I agree that old fashioned optimizing is working well. I like what I see for my sites.

[steveb]

I can't manage to feel sorry for Microsoft, but aside from results a four year old could spam, someone there needs to wake up and understand that most searched for content is not "local". Sites that show up for a search on .com, don't appear anywhere on co.uk. Unlike their results which are just poor quality, it is conceptual idiocy to serve up different english language results for an "alpha centauri" search.

[McMohan]

Hmm.. So MSN is copying Google in providing the cache date. I also see the date is written as mm/dd/yy. Someone from M$ would have done well to atleast comprehend that there is a big enough % of searchers who are used to dd/mm/yy. Though seemingly a small issue, sure doesn't improve the search experience.

Google was smart enough to mention month by letters.

[McMohan]

This beta results on FireFox thing is finally making me to use FireFox after years of IE :)

Mc