I wonder if Bing plays White Christmas in the background during december.

Interesting. I just binged my username. In the hover results next to my main page, it shows the last comment in my no longer available comments section.

I'm generally a fan of google.  I must admit their video searches are quite annoying.  I feel like it gives me more of what I didn't ask to see than what I did.   Access to google maps is a most, and it would be hard for bing to top it.  The fact that Bing recognizes a question though is something that might make me investigate to form my own opinion.

Great review.  I actually scoffed when I first saw the Bing commercial.  I'm still unhappy with the ...well, as you put it

Anyways, thanks for the (apparently unbiased) review.  Now, I may have to check this thing out.

I'm sensing a little paranoia here. You may have to accept the fact that google or not, the Govt, and every other company willing to pay for it, will get your info one way or another.

Personally, I like Googles clean main screen. As Brad put it, Microsoft tends to have too much clutter on their sites. I do commend Bing for their video section. I tested this problem I read on the news that Bing gives easy access to pornography to anyone, including children and it 's true. Just a few clicks to turn off the restriction, which it points to you right off the back, and you can watch short porn films righ from the search screen. Talk about a site I don't want my kids on. As for me, I may keep the video section deep in my bookmarks. 

Good luck finding a search agent that doesn't. Oh, and your provider gets more info out of you than any search provider could ever get.

I'll go for the engine that does NOT bend to the demands of foreign countries to edit/alter reality via censored search results.

Newspeak....the altering of society by the elimination of conceptualization through expression.

Bing: 'Bill is not gone'

Scares me to death!

Which search engine does not engage in this practice?

More bling than bing...

seemed obvious

I tried the beta several days ago. wasn't very impressed, but also not disappointed. sort of a 'not bad, but also not good.'

in your review I saw many things that were not in the beta, so I checked the bing page again. it was still beta until I selected U.S. as a country of origin and voilá, these features came on. so, a little no-no that they didn't not bother to bring my language version out of beta.

I agree, I like the video feature, it's pretty nice. I also tend to like bing's display of images better. if they'd just had the click on the image do a direct link to it instead of to the emdedded website ( that could be an alternate option, like right click 'go to image's website'), it would be sweet.

also I really like that preview window. what first raised my interest in bing was a newspaper item where it mentioned that it provided some info on the search page, before you go to the pages found themselves. however, in the base version I found it was more or less just like in google, which was a bit too little for me. ideally, I'd like the full context of my search keys displayed on the results  page. with this extra box that pops up, it goes in the right direction. just ... I don't think it works particularly well. more often than not, the information there is not that interesting. also, I generally like the results that google gives in basic searches better, but as you said in the op that may be merely subjective.

in any case, nice to have a decent competitor to google. I'm not particularly keen on data mining companies. if they want my data, I want something in return. in a way I am getting something, namely a good search tool. but still ... . so, maybe I'll just end up using both a bit instead of one exclusively. good job ms though. could use a few improvements, but I'd say it's above the barrier of utility (ie it's good enough to be used as is).