

Stepping Out of the Search Box - joemir
http://www.bing.com/blogs/site_blogs/b/search/archive/2013/09/17/refresh.aspx?

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cs702
This buzzword-infused post goes on and on about how Microsoft's "reinvention
of the idea of search" meant they "stepped out of the confines of the search
box," so they "needed to signal a change to the world" \-- with a new Bing
logo that surely cost a lot more to design than most people reading this make
in a year.

For a moment I wondered, WTF?

But then I realized this kind of navel-gazing goes hand-in-hand with the new
strategic 'focus' triumphantly announced by Ballmer two months ago (right
before he was fired): _" our strategy will focus on creating a family of
devices and services for individuals and businesses that empower people around
the globe at home, at work and on the go, for the activities they value
most"_[1] -- that is, be everything for everyone.

Microsoft truly has lost its way.

\--

[1] [http://www.microsoft.com/en-
us/news/Press/2013/Jul13/07-11On...](http://www.microsoft.com/en-
us/news/Press/2013/Jul13/07-11OneMicrosoft.aspx)

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thomasd
It always felt like Microsoft was chasing after markets that people are trying
to leave. Bing trying to replace google search while google is desperately
trying to expand their source of income by looking elsewhere while Facebook
eats into their google's advertising revenue.

Which makes the last paragraph especially interesting. Insights. Have
Microsoft finally figured that search doesn't have much revenue in there to
milk anymore and since they have all these data they've collected at such
massive scale, perhaps provide useful "interpretation" of these data? That
gets me very excited.

And if the result of it all are APIs for developers to use these data, that's
going to change a lot on how we make decisions, at least in the entertainment
industry (which I work in).

~~~
AznHisoka
Can you give me a concrete example on how all that data can be beneficial to
the entertainment industry?

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thomasd
Off the top of my head, content acquisition. Which content to acquire, from
which production house, with which actors, in what language, how did they do
in the theatres. You can compare these indexed data with internal data, and
find correlation. Netflix did them all with in house data, and they can do it
because they have 114,000 years of streams every month[1]. Their dataset is
large enough to pretty much represent what the general public wants. For up
and coming companies, this is very helpful.

[1][http://gigaom.com/2013/09/18/building-vs-buying-how-
netflix-...](http://gigaom.com/2013/09/18/building-vs-buying-how-netflix-
streams-114000-years-of-video-every-month/)

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Felix21
This was exciting at the beginning.

"stepping out of the confines of the search box"

"reinventing search"

... what could this new search be? how will it work? is bing finally
innovating and thinking for itself?

No. No.

Turns out they just designed a new logo.

~~~
AznHisoka
Hey, man it's innovative! Just like those cool new frameworks that read JSON!
And that cool stickers from Trello! Artificial intelligence that can read your
mind? State of the art voice recognition? Pfft.. forget that.

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chrismonsanto
Justification for new logos seem to be given by placing the logo on a grid and
using straight lines to show the relationship between the elements. We see it
in this blog post, and we saw it for the Yahoo logo.

Serious question: what are these grids and lines supposed to show me? One
would assume there would be intrinsic motivation for the lines chosen (such as
a relationship to a simple mathematical object/idea). But to me the lines
always look chosen to fit the design, instead of the design fitting the lines.

For example: [http://www.bing.com/blogs/cfs-
file.ashx/__key/communityserve...](http://www.bing.com/blogs/cfs-
file.ashx/__key/communityserver-blogs-components-
weblogfiles/00-00-00-41-77/3-Bing-grid_5F00_small.jpg)

How was this angle chosen for the lines? Why three of them? The lines are
parallel, but are they meant to be slightly different distances from each
other? If you drew a line in the opposite direction, but aligned it to the
slant of the graphic, is that 'correct'?

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cabirum
So they made an exact copy of Google's results? [1]

Also, isn't the new logo too similar to g drive?

[1] [http://i.imgur.com/g2SOVCm.png](http://i.imgur.com/g2SOVCm.png)

~~~
simba-hiiipower
come on, for real?

[http://oi43.tinypic.com/1ou543.jpg](http://oi43.tinypic.com/1ou543.jpg)

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dougk16
The new logo's not bad, but having to explain why a logo is cool is kind of
like explaining why a joke is funny...just doesn't work.

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excitom
Yeah, a new logo, that's what they need.

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joshuahedlund
"This was much more than just a new logo or a single brainstorm"

<pretty much just describes a new logo and color palette>

"The new Bing identity is more than a new logo and color palette"

Sounds like they're trying to convince themselves, telling not showing, etc.

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a3voices
So their conclusion is they need a new logo?

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raheemm
Bill Gates should come back.

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EGreg
Oh boy. Let's hope Microsoft digs its head out of its butt with new management
at the helm.

