Wow. Earlier this month, I heard Microsoft execs highlight Live Search Books as a key advance they were doing in search. Today, news that the site along with Live Search Academic are being closed next week, since they lack the "high consumer intent" that Microsoft is now focusing on. So much for trying to seem like the much-needed "good" alternative to Google. From Microsoft's blog post: Today we informed our partners that we are ending the Live Search Books and Live Search Academic projects and that both sites will be taken down next week. Books and scholarly publications wi [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Consumer | Microsoft: Live Search Academic | Microsoft: Live Search Books

A new paper from Microsoft Research, Web Object Retrieval (pdf), discusses an approach towards Web indexing that changes focus from page level, to that of indexing objects found upon pages. OK, so that does that mean? It's easiest to show you first, rather than tell you... Microsoft Product Search Take a look at Microsoft's Products Search (http://products.live.com/). Brian Smith went into a lot of detail on the Microsoft's product search last May in eCommerce, Microsoft Style. Microsoft's Live Product Search allows people to upload product information into their database, but it also cr [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEO | Microsoft: Bing | Microsoft: Bing SEO | Microsoft: Live Search Academic

Last October, Microsoft's Steve Ballmer gave us a taste of how Microsoft was going to position Google as a copyright leech. Today, Microsoft launched a full-out assault on the company. Google deserves some of this, no doubt. But the idea as Microsoft as some altruistic copyright savior deserves some critical analysis, as well. Below, I'll dissect Microsoft's slams against Google, pointing out where they can be redirected back at Microsoft itself. But overall, I remain in agreement that Google should shift book search to an opt-in basis when dealing with copyrighted works. As noted, last Octobe [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEO | Google: Book Search | Google: Critics | Google: General | Legal: Copyright | Legal: Crawling & Indexing | Microsoft: General | Microsoft: Live Search Academic | Microsoft: Live Search Books

The Live Search Blog announced that Microsoft released a beta named Live Search Books this morning. Plus they enhanced Live Search Academic by adding millions of new articles, plus indexing theses, dissertations, and books within these disciplines. The details on Live Search Books Beta: The U.S. beta launch of Live Search Books is a big step forward in advancing the way people discover information through the integration of content that has been "off-limits [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Consumer | Microsoft: Live Search Academic | Microsoft: Live Search Books | Search Engines: Academic Search Engines | Search Engines: Book Search Engines