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Microsoft: 'We do not copy Google's results'

zdnet.com

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Re: Microsoft: 'We do not copy Google's results'

#61

Post by kenjackson »

jerf wrote: post #58
kenjackson wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I put even money that this helps their mindshare. For people that use Google/Bing explicitly today -- no delta. But for a lot of people this is going to sound like, "Google catches Bing cheating". And for a lot of people this is going to sound like, "Google complains about competitor Bing". Given where Bing mindshare and marketshare is today versus its search qualty, I think this isn't a horrible place to be. Esepcia…

'"Google complains about competitor Bing"' "Bing is too weak to stand on its own and it knows it, so it cheats." I do not think the court of public opinion is going to let go of the word "cheating" so rapidly. It's a toxic word, and whether or not you think it's true it's supported well enough that it won't matter.

I think you overstate it. Ask your dentist about the MS antitrust case and if MS cheated in it. I bring up dentists, because way back when it happened mine gave me a monologue about how MS was being raked over the coals because of how good they were.

He didn't know anything about, in this case, actual fraudalant and illegal practices. And this was a much bigger story at the time than this is likely to be, by orders of magnitude.

Most people, to this day, think that MS was sued because they were a monopoly. Not because of illegal practices while a monopoly.

Given that its Google bringing the charges, and not the DOJ, I think also weakens it.

And lastly, the fact that it's not illegal, also makes it look like whining. Steroids are illegal and generally considered really bad, and the American public hardly cares about that. If Barry Bonds was a nicer guy the public may well have demanded they make steroids legal! :-)

My point, since I rambled, this will be more he said/she said. And less one sided than I think you believe.

Re: Microsoft: 'We do not copy Google's results'

#62

Post by lanstein »

rbanffy wrote: post #26
contextfree wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

moreover, Clinton's statement was an outright lie, not an evasion. And it didn't seem to hurt his approval ratings. The analogy makes no sense.

> Clinton's statement was an outright lie He employed a very narrow definition of "sexual relations" that was made possible by the ambiguity of what a sexual relationship actually is.

It depends on what your definition of is, is.

Re: Microsoft: 'We do not copy Google's results'

#63

Post by dunham »

jameskilton wrote: post #7
gst wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you know that they target search sites? This could also be a more generic approach: If there's a link from page A to page B also return page B if someone searches for page A's keywords and there are only few results.

Have you read the original claim? Google did a test with completely nonsense words and 100% unrelated search results with those terms. The results showed up on Bing. Whatever Bing is doing, it is using Google's search data. http://searchengineland.com/google-bing-is-cheating-copying-...

Right, but the nonsense word is part of the referring URL for the link that the user is clicking.

Re: Microsoft: 'We do not copy Google's results'

#64

Post by ac2u »

mc32 wrote: post #59
pg wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because if Bing has to rely on Google Search's solutions to problems it should itself be able to solve, that implies it's inferior technology.

It's not really relying on Google's search solutions at all. It's relying on users' search behavior. It's coincidental that they (users) use Google and that they happen to always click on the bogus result --when no other data are available. Their method, when no data is available for a search term, is to sometimes (7 out of 100?) rely on human ranked results (in this case gamed by Google) via user behavior gathered w…

You put what I was thinking more succinctly than I could. I don't like the witch-hunt attitude when there's no proof that they directly focused their metrics on Google.

Re: Microsoft: 'We do not copy Google's results'

#65

Post by brudgers »

pg wrote: post #23
kenjackson wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would potential employees take this negatively? This is exactly the type of thing I'd love to work on. Give me opt-in to your web browsing characteristics, and let me optimize your searches. Opt-in is the key. I'm certainly an odd one here, but I'm more inclined to use the Bing toolbar due to this, although the perf cost is still too high to use any toolbar, IMO. What would be nice is if the browsers had an open…

Because if Bing has to rely on Google Search's solutions to problems it should itself be able to solve, that implies it's inferior technology.

What I see is that Bing filtered out 93/100 of the deliberately planted seeds, and what I don't see is how many times Google sent each seed packet to Microsoft. If Google sent each packet through the Bing tool bar once, it is different than if they sent each one through 1000 times. [edit] In that case what Google did was exploit a feature of Bing toolbar in a manner somewhat akin to an injection attack. It is also not evident what Google tried that didn't work.[/edit]

Finally, what I find interesting is that Google basically broke what they claim to be their prime directive - not hard coding search rankings - for PR purposes. There isn't a good story behind that either way. Either approval came from the top, in which case senior management broke the directive to embarrass a competitor or it was broken by cowboys outside of management control. Of course it is also possible that this sort of thing is done regularly within the course of business.

[Aside] I want to be the first to dub this "Binggate."

Re: Microsoft: 'We do not copy Google's results'

#66

Post by brudgers »

spiffworks wrote: post #37
contextfree wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Problems like returning meaningful results for "hiybbprqag"?

No, problems like returning meaningful results for "torsoraphy". See the first example that is provided in Danny Sullivan's post.

Not to rationalize away the similarity between nonsense words and search results, but there are legitimate reasons why gross misspellings might yield similar results. Among them are that similar algorithms may have been derived from similar libraries and academic literature.

With 25+ years in the word processor business Microsoft certainly has significant experience with spell check and algorithmically deciphering bungled words - The claim that Google has better code for deciphering jumbled spelling is not self-evident.

Re: Microsoft: 'We do not copy Google's results'

#67

Post by contextfree »

brudgers wrote: post #66
spiffworks wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, problems like returning meaningful results for "torsoraphy". See the first example that is provided in Danny Sullivan's post.

Not to rationalize away the similarity between nonsense words and search results, but there are legitimate reasons why gross misspellings might yield similar results. Among them are that similar algorithms may have been derived from similar libraries and academic literature. With 25+ years in the word processor business Microsoft certainly has significant experience with spell check and algorithmically deciphering bu…

The suspicious part is that the "corrected" version only appeared in one link, the first. So it doesn't seem to have actually recognized the misspelling as such, but associated it with the Wikipedia page through some other mechanism. There's definitely a circumstantial case that it's through the Google clickstream, though I don't think that's the only plausible explanation (especially given that it's a Wikipedia page).

Re: Microsoft: 'We do not copy Google's results'

#68

Post by ars »

joelhaus wrote: post #57
kenjackson wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"rely"? It's using customer behavior as a signal. Someone typing into a search box and clicking a link is a pretty good signal, regardless of where the search happens. This only implies inferior technology if this is the only signal you have in determining relevance, but clearly they have tons of them. The fact that they're trying to capture the totality of the user experience is a very good thing (again with opt-in)…

Exposing this practice has also introduced another potential problem for Bing. Gaming of their search results. I would expect to see spammers sending many thousands/millions of clicks on specific Google search results through Bing's Toolbar for long-tail queries.

You'd first have to get the result to come up as a result of your search.

(Although I suppose you could hack the toolbar and send the data manually.)

Re: Microsoft: 'We do not copy Google's results'

#69

Post by giberson »

Pragmatically, the following scenario underlines why this is practice is overall bad for the consumer.

  Company A produces product 1.
  Company B produces product 2 inferior to product 1.
  Consumers use product 1.
  Company B enhances product 2 by actively engaging product 1.
  Some consumers use product 2.
  Company B product 2 rises in market share.
  More consumers user product 2.
  Company A drops product 1 due to lack of profits.
  Product 2 quality deteriorates due to absence of product 1.
  Consumers left with inferior product option.

Re: Microsoft: 'We do not copy Google's results'

#70

Post by brudgers »

contextfree wrote: post #67
brudgers wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to rationalize away the similarity between nonsense words and search results, but there are legitimate reasons why gross misspellings might yield similar results. Among them are that similar algorithms may have been derived from similar libraries and academic literature. With 25+ years in the word processor business Microsoft certainly has significant experience with spell check and algorithmically deciphering bu…

The suspicious part is that the "corrected" version only appeared in one link, the first. So it doesn't seem to have actually recognized the misspelling as such, but associated it with the Wikipedia page through some other mechanism. There's definitely a circumstantial case that it's through the Google clickstream, though I don't think that's the only plausible explanation (especially given that it's a Wikipedia page…

Right. Typically, Wikipedia would know have a record of the search term being used to reach the page. Of course, it is plausible only if Wikipedia shares that information with others.
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