“Google” has delayed experiencing the same fate as kerosene, heroin, laundromat, and a number of other brand names that became so popular they died of genericide. [More]
search engines
Facebook Testing In-App Search Engine Powered By Users’ Posts
By 5.11.15
For those moments when it’s just too much work to copy a link on your phone’s web browser, open up the Facebook app and hit “paste,” the social network is now testing out an “add link” option that uses an in-app search engine. [More]
More Google Searches Are Done On Mobile Devices Than PCs For First Time
By 5.5.15
In the beginning, a person with a question that needed to be answered would shout, “To the Google!” and that would most often mean sitting in front of a desktop computer or opening a laptop. Not so, anymore: For the first time, U.S. Googlers are Googling more on mobile devices than personal computers. [More]
FTC Report Alleges Google Used Anti-Competitive Practices Prior To 2013
By 3.20.15
When conducting a search on Google, consumers have a reasonable expectation that results will show a variety of options related to their inquiry. But a recently disclosed report shows that wasn’t always the case. [More]
Firefox Breaks Up With Google, Makes Yahoo The Browser’s Default Search Engine
By 11.20.14
Right now, Google is probably on the couch wrapped in blankets with The Notebook on repeat, eyeballs deep in a trough of chocolate ice cream. Mozilla dumped Google this week after three years together, as Firefox’s default search engine, and has decided to go steady with Yahoo instead. [More]
Disney’s Search Engine Patent Lumps Movie Piracy In With Child Porn
By 10.31.14
The folks at Disney have patented a search engine that ranks and filters out results based on “authenticity” metrics, allowing it to exclude “undesirable” results, which it describes only as “results referencing piracy websites, child pornography websites, and/or the like,” lumping in people trying to watch Finding Nemo for free with dangerous sexual predators. [More]
Bing Adds The Option To Search The Internet With Emojis
By 10.28.14
For all those moments when the words escape you and you’re thinking strictly in pictures, search engine Bing announced this week that it’s launching a new option to cruise for answers on the Internet using emojis. [More]
FTC To Search Engines: Do A Better Job Of Labeling Paid Search Results As Ads
By 6.26.13
A decade ago, the Federal Trade Commission told the major Internet search engines that they should be more transparent about search results that received premium placement because the advertiser paid for it. The companies eventually obliged, but the FTC says that search engines have backslid and begun being less-than-transparent again, and that they could still do more to distinguish between ads and organic search results. [More]
Survey Says We're Not Okay With Search Engines Collecting Personal Data
By 3.9.12
As companies like Google and Facebook fall under scrutiny for their online privacy policies, Americans are getting uncomfortable with the the fact that using a search engines could turn over their personal data for collection and targeted advertising. [More]
How To Banish Google's Personalized Gimmickry From Your Search Results
By 1.13.12
If you’re not a fan of Google’s new personal search results and would rather return to the old Googling you’re used to, you can do so with a few simple steps. [More]
Google Warning Infected Users About Malware
By 7.20.11
Google has started putting a yellow box with a warning at the top of search results pages for users who may have been infected with a certain kind of malware. [More]
Google Turns Its Eyes To The Skies With Flight Tracking Function
By 5.31.11
In its ongoing effort to maintain prominence in the search engine wars, Google added a handy feature that lets you search the names of two cities, along with “flights from” and “to” in order to get a quick glance of the selection of regular flights that connect them. [More]
Bing, Google Both Gain Search Engine Market Share As Yahoo Fades
By 4.14.11
Microsoft’s Bing continues to carve out a spot for itself in the search engine market, but it can’t seem to make up much ground against Google, which matched its gains from February to March, according to one report. [More]
Google Slaps Overstock.com On The Wrists For Tinkering With Search Results
By 2.24.11
The search engine police at Google have penalized Overstock.com after finding that the online retailer was artificially boosting its prominence on search results by effectively paying for links on .edu sites. [More]
Bing Cashback Ends July 30
By 6.7.10
Microsoft said it’s shutting down the Bing Cashback program July 30th. [More]
Should Google Be Broken Apart?
By 4.20.10
The consumer group Consumer Watchdog is planning to ask the Justice Department to “launch an antitrust action against the search giant and seek remedies including a possible break up,” reports the San Francisco Chronicle. The group will host a press conference in Washington, D.C. tomorrow where it will argue that there’s enough evidence to warrant antitrust action from the feds. [More]
Yahoo And Twitter Announce Unholy Alliance Of Social Networking
By 2.24.10
Perhaps as a response to Google’s monumentally successful launch (at least in terms of irritating Gmail users) of Google Buzz, Yahoo announced on Tuesday that they have entered into a partnership of sorts with social networking biggie Twitter, apparently in an attempt to bring Yahoo up to speed with the rest of the Internet. [More]
Ask.com Launches New Service To Find The Best Deals
By 10.7.09
Ask.com has launched a new service—ask.com/deals—dedicated to finding the best deals online. We don’t know how well it works, but we like the tabs that let you quickly jump to free shipping offers and printable coupons. It might be a decent starting place if you’re in the market for something and need to comparison shop first. Update: Our readers say it’s not worth your time, at least in its current state—results are paltry and frequently old or expired.
