James Poling

I read an interesting post the other day by someone explaining why they were changing their default search engine from Google to Yahoo. I can’t for the life of me remember where I read it because I would love to quote and attrubute it.  I very much identified with the point that the person was making, and was thinking Bing came around just in time to give it a shot.

I’ve had the same gmail account since 2004. I use it as my personal account as well as filtering all of my business accounts through there. It’s my one login for all of my email accounts.  I also use Picasa Web for all my photos, Google Docs for my documents that I store online, Google Reader knows all the feeds I’m subscribed to and my Enterprise calendar is synced up with my Gmail calendar and, when it’s an option, I tend to use Google Checkout for purchases. Now I even have a Google profile.

The point of the post I read was, with all that information, do I really want Google to know what I’m searching for? Search is the one part of your experience that really reveals the most about you and your habits. Are we giving Google too much information to build profiles on us to target us with eerily specific marketing data?  Sure, it may be a sound a bit tinfoil hat-ish but it also has its merits. Simply by switching search engines you can seperate much of your “anonymous” info from your “personal info”.

The one problem with that theory is that for some reason I really loathe Yahoo’s search. Now with Bing’s release last night I think I’ll give it a shot for a week and see what I think. For the next week I’ll use Bing as my default search engine thereby seperating my search for “hot japanese girls eating ice cream” from my Google overloards and the rest of my online personal info.

Here’s how to set up Bing as your default search engine in Firefox and Chrome:

Chrome:

1. Click on the customize and control wrench on the top write of your browser.
2. Choose options
3. Make sure you’re on the Basics tab
4. Choose Live Search as your default search engine
5. Click cloes and you’re all set.

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It’s a little more complicated to choose Bing as your default engine in Firefox considering Firefox’s native search doesn’t have Live Search as one of its native search choices.

Firefox:

1. Go here and install the Bing plugin.
2. Once you install the plugin Live Search will show up in your dropdown options in your Firefox searchbox.
3. Click that and you’re all set.

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The thing about the next big thing is that you never really know it’s the next big thing until it’s the next big thing.  I’m not in anyway trying to take anything away from Google’s product or what they’ve created, but to be fair, you can’t give a fair criticism of a brand new search platform that’s been out only 24 hours. Imagine what people were saying about Google when it first came on the scene, completely blank with a text box for search and an “I’m Feeling Lucky” button. Coming on to compete with the most visited portal on the internet at the time Yahoo.com. Granted much of Bing’s algorithms are probably based on Live Search, but I don’t think even Microsoft is arrgant enough to not realize that it’s a work in progress that can be improved upon.

I’m going to give Bing a try for a week and see what comes of it. Even if it’s only that Google can’t put my search for “rash cream” in the same vault as the rest of my personal information that I trust it with.