Bing Watch . . . Just Bing It!

Welcome to Los Angeles: Bing’s parent opens a new store at the center of Hollywood and Beverly Hills mall, located just few stores away from Apple store, or about 5 stop-lights from popular Rodeo Drive

Bing’s parent has settled down at the city of Angels and officially christened a new store with a big ceremony this morning at 9:30am Pacific Time.  The new store is located inside Westfield Century City Mall, 10250 Santa Monica Blvd., about 5 stop-lights from popular Rodeo Drive.  At the same mall, there is also standing an Apple store which has been doing business there for many years. 

According to Microsoft Store Facebook fans page, in order to get people to visit the grand ceremony, only the first 200 lucky people will get two VIP passes to watch Nick Jonas and Jasmine V performance at a nearby open space event.  Additional 800 people will get 2 tickets to watch the same show. 

For first day’s opening shoppers, they will receive two movie tickets to watch any movies at theater located at the same mall.

(Image: Microsoft Store Facebook fans page)

Bing’s Photosynth team upgrades app for Apple iOS with v1.1 and offers weekly contest for a chance to win an Xbox 360 and Kinect hand-free controller

The decision engine’s Photosynth team urged over 3,500,000 app users to send in their mobile panorama photos to the organizer for a chance to win an Xbox 360 and Kinect hand-free controller.  Cool looking panoramas will be featured in the “Best of Bing Maps” photo website.   To be eligible, users must be at least 14 or older when they submitted their panoramas to the contest organizer.  Deadline for submission is the day after Columbus Day, Tuesday, October 11, 2011.

The Photosynth app was launched on April 18 and later became one of the most popular iOS apps during Royal Wedding in late April this year.

Early today Bing's Photosynth team has upgraded the two months old app v1.0 with a new version v1.1.  In the new version v1.1, the Photosynth team added several new features such as email access, easy sharing with Facebook fans, and other controls for panoramas photos.  The Photosynth app is currently working only on Apple iOS hardware include iPhones, iPads, and iPods.  Go to iTunes www.itunes.com/apps/photosynth to download the app.

(Image: photosynth.net)

It’s not ready yet: the Google+ project begins a series of trials and errors to compete with social networking powerhouse Facebook

Bing’s rival Google invited a few good men and women to try the giant search engine’s social products early this morning.  Industry watchers have speculated for a long time that Google will one day launch its own social networking to compete directly with powerhouse Facebook.   Google+ project will include features dubbed as Circles, Sparks, Hangouts and Mobile.  Those features help users to share their info and activities online.  Click here to check it out.

On the launch date this morning, it appears that the social products were not ready yet, as Google official blog wrote “We’re beginning in Field Trial, so you may find some rough edges, and the project is by invitation only.”  At the moment, it looks like a mess of unconnected features. 

Bing and its closest partner Facebook should be more than happy to see something that’s not ready yet on Google’s side.  While Google is playing catch up, the decision engine has integrated many features with the social networking since last year.  In mid-May this year, Bing also started to promote social search via a series of video commercials.

 

(Watch video: the Google+ project via YouTube)

Bing Maps World Tour released GeoArt application and updated 153 locations with high-resolution aerial mapping imagery

Bing Maps team released GeoArt application last weekend which let users to see high-resolution aerial mapping imagery.  Bing Maps team updated 153 locations with great pictures for the decision engine users to enjoy this summer.  Click here to start viewing high quality pictures.

The latest updates were the work of Bing Maps Global Ortho project.  According to the team blog, this well-funded project is scheduled for completion in the next twelve months.  For this pilot project, only the 50 states of America and Western Europe will be mapped by this sophisticated mapping technology.

"Decode Jay-Z with Bing" an outdoor campaign for the decision engine has won the Grand Prix award at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity

The advertising agency, Droga 5, who created ads campaign for Bing partnership with rapper and celebrity Jay-Z which dubbed as "Decode Jay-Z with Bing" has won a special award at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, as reported by adage.com.   The agency won the Grand Prix award for the outdoor category.

The "Decode Jay-Z with Bing" campaign to promote the decision engine was started on October 18 and ended on November 16, 2010.   During the one-month campaign, Bing also run a giveaway contest in conjunction with the release of Jay-Z’s first book with a title as “Decoded.”  Each contestant must visit several online pages and then must find a unique code from outdoor billboards, and then they must send texting for a chance to win a grand prize of two tickets to Jay-Z concert in Las Vegas for celebrating New Year 2011.

 
(Image: Decode Jay-Z with Bing)

Let’s say hello to NUads “Natural User Interface Ads,” a new type of interactive ads by utilizing the power of Microsoft’s Kinect for Xbox 360

Bing’s parent Microsoft unveiled a new type of interactive ads by utilizing the power of voice and motion control of Kinect for Xbox 360 at the Cannes International Advertising Festival on June 21.  The new technology dubbed as NUads, or “Natural User Interface Ads.”

According to a blog post by Mark Kroese, a General Manager of Microsoft’s Advertising Business Group, NUads is catered to attract TV advertising with an interactive experience via Xbox console and Xbox LIVE.

During the introduction and demo period, NUads interactive advertising provides five NUads formats, include:

• Social advocacy: using voice command, for example user can say "Xbox Tweet" to send tweet to friends.
• Request for information (RFI): using voice command to request more info, for example user can say "Xbox More" to ask for more information, or to request a special offer.
• Near me: user can also say "Xbox Near Me" to find a store close by and receive a SMS with location data.
• Schedule an event: user can also say "Xbox Schedule" to receive a schedule of dates about future events.
• Vote for your favorite: this feature allows users to use their body motion or wave by a hand to decide on their choices.

(Image: NUads “Natural User Interface Ads” video via Bing)

Bing hires Resultrix marketing agency to handle search marketing campaigns and help reducing the cost per click (CPC)

The decision engine has hired its hometown digital marketing agency, Resultrix, to tackle Bing’s search marketing campaigns.  With the help of Resultrix, Bing marketing team hopes to reduce the cost per click (CPC) to promote the decision engine for a long run.

According to Resultrix press release, the digital marketing agency who has its headquarter in Bellevue, recently recognized as the Top 10 companies to work for in Bing’s home state Washington.  Aside Bing as a new client, Resultrix also works with Concur, Corbis Corporation, Puget Sound Energy, and Bing's parent Microsoft Learning division.

Bing website deactivated IPv6 support after 24-hour test of the next generation of Internet on June 8, but Xbox website will maintain IPv6 support until further notice

Bing team announced today that the decision engine support for World IPv6 Day was lasted only 24 hours on June 7-8 testing period.  Bing tested its site starting on June 7 (Tuesday) at 5:00 p.m. Pacific Time and ended 24 hours later.  After that day Bing had disabled IPv6 support.  As per Bing team wrote “…the test of the next-generation Internet went entirely well.”  Bing team is now working hard to make sure the entire web properties can support IPv6 for a long run.

On the other positive side of Bing’s family member Xbox, the top video gaming website was also successfully tested their entire web properties, include www.xbox.com, live.xbox.com, and marketplace.xbox.com.   Given the important of online gaming business for Microsoft revenue plus the popularity of Kinect hands-free motion controller, Xbox website will maintain IPv6 support until further notice.

(Image: worldipv6day.org)

Hands-free decision engine: the next upgrade to Bing could be using visual and body motions to conduct web search, as Microsoft releases Kinect for Windows SDK beta

Bing’s parent Microsoft released Kinect for Windows SDK beta on Thursday June 16.   The starter kit includes APIs, sample code, and drivers.  This will let developers and hobbyists to build applications running on Windows 7 OS by utilizing technology from Kinect motion sensor for Xbox 360.   With the latest release, Microsoft also urged academic research and applications developers to build exciting apps. 

The next upgrade to Bing could be using visual and body motions to conducting web search, such as gesture computing similar to Tom Cruise 2002 movie’s “Minority Report.” 

By combining hands-free and motion control to the personal computer, it will eliminate the need of a keyboard and a mouse.  Tech-savvy, hobbyists, and professional developers can build new type of user interfaces to make searching on the web faster.   In the next few weeks or months, the decision engine users can conduct search by using body motions.

(Image: Kinect for Windows SDK beta)

Bing team picked five American winners of $100 each for “Friends Don’t Let Friends Decide Alone” contest that was run via Twitter on June 1

After the giveaway challenge ended two weeks ago, this morning Bing team had randomly selected five American winners of the “Friends Don’t Let Friends Decide Alone” contest.  The contest was run via Twitter on June 1.  Only @bing followers in America can submit their tweets.  The Bing's sweepstakes question was read as "What decision can you not make without your friends?"   Each winner will receive $100 each, they can spend the 100 bucks to buy drinks and hang out with friends.  The contest was run to promote Bing’s new social features in conjunction with social search from Facebook.

The 5 American winners with their location (city and state) and their Twitter IDs are:

1. Zane Condren (San Antonio, Texas): @zcondren
2. Toni Moore (Bradenton, Florida): @VectoringMomma
3. Lovi (Bronx, New York): @lovinmomma8
4. Nick (Manhattan, Kansas): @Izzmo
5. Crissy (Pittsburg, Philadelphia): @durstslovepens

Bing’s REDU project was chosen as Webby Award Winner for Activism category during the 15th Annual Webbys ceremony for 2011 at the Hammerstein Ballroom in New York

The year of 2011 Annual Webby Awards was held at the Hammerstein Ballroom in New York on Monday June 13 evening.  According to the official website, organizer received about 10,000 entries from America and from more than 60 countries around the world.  The Awards selection is under the guidance of the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences.   This year sponsors include Bing’s parent Microsoft, the search alliance partner Yahoo, the decision engine social search partner Facebook, and other major corporations.

As part of Bing team, REDU project website was designed by Creative Artists Agency.  The website won the Webby Award Winner for Activism category.  

Since its inception, REDU continues to help America’s education system and institution.   Volunteers, donators, and educators have utilized the website to connect to others and find helps.  At the same time many disadvantage schools and under-funded school projects received a ton of financial rewards from donators via Bing’s partner DonorsChoose.org.

Facebook, the decision engine’s closest social partner, experiencing traffic drops in America and in other advanced nations, as losing users in advanced nations could hurt Bing because it will be replaced by users from developed countries

While the decision engine continues to add more features and collaborate with the social networking Facebook, however, based on data provided by insidefacebook.com thru insidenetwork.com data service, Facebook experienced a significant drop in its web traffic in America by the end of May 2011.  Although Facebook is on track to reach an all-time high record of 700 million users in June 2011, many early adopter countries experienced drop of users, include Canada, Britain, Norway, and in its birthplace country America.  Facebook total users count in America has dropped about 6 million users in May 2011, reported insidefacebook.com.  In the beginning of June, there were only 149.4 million users in America, compared to the beginning of May at 155.2 million users.

Many factors for the recent lost of users in America and in other advanced nations.  One of those includes college graduations during the first week of May and high-school graduations in the last week of May.  

Another hurdle for Bing is that the decision engine is unknown in many developed countries and other late comers to the Internet world such as Indonesia, Brazil, etc.  Most of the new Facebook users who will replace advanced nations users are from developed countries.  Bing will compete heavily with local search engines while at the same time Google is also a dominant player there.

(Table: insidenetwork.com)

Unchanged: the search alliance share of search market remained at 30.0%, as Bing’s share continued at 14.1% and Yahoo’s share maintained at 15.9% in May 2011

Monthly figures for market share of Internet searches in America were unchanged in May 2011, as per the latest data from comScore.  The decision engine market share remained at 14.1% in May 2011, compared to 14.1% share in April. 

Yahoo’s share maintained at 15.9% in May 2011.  The search alliance combo between Bing and Yahoo remained at 30.0% exactly.

Google captured 65.5% share in May, compared to 65.4% share in April 2011 (an increase of 0.1% share).

(Table: comScore)

Bing It On and Vote: the decision engine to sponsor Oxygen's The Glee Project with the premiere episode starts on Sunday June 12, 2011

The decision engine is set to sponsor Oxygen's new reality series with a premiere episode starts on Sunday June 12, 2011.  12 contestants will compete to win as the star of the Glee Project.  According to Bing team blog, 40,000 people participated during the pre-selection for the contest, but organizer just picked 12 contenders to compete for the final starting this Sunday.  

On Bing team blog post, the decision engine urged its users to help to decide and pick a favorite contestant.  One winner as "Bing Fan Favorite" will receive $10K.  Bing users can submit their vote thru desktop computer or mobile device.  Click here to go to Fan Favorite voting page.

By joining with Oxygen's new reality series, Bing could attract a bunch of new young users.   Bing marketing team can merge Bing brand with TV viewers.  Aside promoting via traditional media such as TV, Bing also expands its reach to get votes thru social networking site Facebook.

Images: (left) The Glee Project wall via Facebook and (top) Bing wall via Facebook

Bing for Mobile adds more social networking features on Facebook and other features for news, local listings, transit and walking directions

The decision engine for mobile (m.bing.com) added more social networking features on Facebook.  The new feature will let users to easily share images with other Facebook friends.  Users can see more info on images and give thumb up “Like” and write comments on images. 

Bing for Mobile also added other features for News section.  Users can easily find short headlines news, as this section is now simplified to show only three most popular headlines and images.  However, during the beta test, this new feature is only available for American users.  Bing Maps also gets new upgrades to help users conducting local search and find transit and walking directions.

According to Bing team blog, the new mobile features run only on mobile devices that support HTML5 browsers.  The new features will only available for the top three smartphones include iPhone iOS, Google Android and RIM BlackBerry (must have OS 6.0 and higher).

 
(Screenshot: Bing team)

IPV6 Test Flight Day: the decision engine will convert to IPv6 connectivity starting on June 7 (Tuesday) at 5:00 p.m. Pacific Time for the next 24 hours

All major Internet companies include Bing, Google, Yahoo!, Facebook, and others will start testing their services using IPv6 and developing plans for transition from IPv4 addresses.  According to Bing team blog, the decision engine will convert to IPv6 connectivity starting on June 7 (Tue) at 5:00 p.m. Pacific Time for the next 24 hours.  Bing team announced the plan for IPv6 on February 3 this year.

Bing team also warned that not all computer devices could access IPv6 yet.  It depends on the latest hardware models, for example if they run on Windows 7 operating system.  Network providers, include Akamai and Limelight Networks, will also play a key role during the test.

(Image: worldipv6day.org)

Bing + Xbox 360: the decision engine is coming to the world’s most popular games console

Bing, the decision engine, is coming to Xbox 360 games console soon.   The announcement was made during a live Microsoft Xbox “The Future Revealed” press conference at 10:00am PST, on June 6, 2011.  The event was organized by Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) at Los Angeles Convention Center.

During today’s live demo at E3, the Xbox team also showed new features for the decision engine, include gamers can utilize voice-enabled search on Bing, for Xbox users with a Kinect hand-free controller.  Most of those new features will be available this coming Fall 2011.

The new Bing voice-search feature for Xbox 360 game console will only available in English language.  At noon today, Yusuf Mehdi, Bing's Senior Vice President, posted an update via Bing team blog.  On it, Mehdi wrote “Bing on Xbox will initially be available in English in the United States, Canada and United Kingdom, and we’re committed to bring voice search to as many languages and dialects as possible in the future.”

 
(Image: (top) Microsoft Xbox Live “The Future Revealed” demo at E3 and (bottom) Xbox @ E3 website)

Bing’s family mobile operating system, Windows Phone, had only a 6.7% share of America’s smartphone market by the end of April 2011, while the future of WP will look very bright due to Mango and Nokia

The new mobile operating system from Bing’s family dubbed as Windows Phone 7 and its legacy Windows Mobile OSs had a total of 6.7% share of America’s smartphone market by the end of April 2011, as per data provided by comScore.  The new OS was released during the third week of October 2010 in Australia, Asia, and Europe.  Then, it went on sales during the first week of November 2010 in America.

Bing’s rival Google captured more users in America’s smartphone market share by the end of April 2011.  The giant search company’s mobile operating system Android continues to hold number one spot as it captured 36.4% share of smartphone subscribers in America (an increase of 5.2% share from the three-month period before the start of February 2011).

The only hope for Bing’s family mobile operating system is the next release dubbed as “Mango” or Windows Phone 7.5 and its partnership with Nokia hardware maker.   As reported by businessweek.com yesterday, Nokia executives are working hard to entertain their investors.  One week ago Bing's parent gave a sneak peek of the future release of Windows Phone OS, it will include many features that benefitting the decision engine users, as “Mango” will make Bing smarter and faster.

(Table: comScore)

To improve the display of search results and to be recognized by all search providers, Bing, Google and Yahoo! are holding hands to build a single schema for web of objects

Top search providers, include Bing, Google and Yahoo!, have agreed to work together to create a single schema, so webmasters could use to explain their sites.   The new join forces will be known as schema.org initiative.  By using a single schema for all search engines, it will help them to understand structured data behind web pages.

Today, each search providers recognize so many different sites and data behind those sites, as schema.org website explains that “Many sites are generated from structured data, which is often stored in databases. When this data is formatted into HTML, it becomes very difficult to recover the original structured data.”  The schema.org initiative will share all schemas for webmasters from around the world, so they can use them to easily explain their sites in simpler vocabulary.

Bing’s Twitter account is giving away $100 each to five followers in America if they tweet answer to a question with #decisions hashtag (open from 9:00 am to 9:00 pm Pacific Time, Wednesday, June 1)

The decision engine's Twitter account @Bing is giving away $100 each to five followers.  The Bing's sweepstakes question read: "What decision can you not make without your friends?"  The contest starts from 9:00 am to 9:00 pm Pacific Time, Wednesday, June 1, 2011.

Not all Bing’s 133,059 followers from around the world will be eligible.  However, if those followers who live in America and 18 years of age or older, they can tweet their answer with #decisions hashtag to @Bing.  

Also, the decision engine requires new followers to stay at least for the next two months, as per the rule read “You must remain a follower until August 1, 2011 to be contacted if you win.”

In the last few months Bing team has been very busy to promote the launch of several new social networking features which integrate the opinions of Facebook’s friends into search results.  The decision engine has also started to run new video commercials with Facebook’s flavor since May 20.

 
(Screenshot: @Bing Twitter account)