Saturday, October 17, 2009

All your domains are belong to us: a short offhand comment on wwwbing.com

No children, that was not a typographical error on my title. It does read wwwbing.com, which according to Tech Crunch, is a troll website. If you ask me, that should not be a problem for Microsoft. Why? Please read this article on slate.com (disclaimer: slate.com is a Microsoft-owned magazine).

Do I need to explain any further? Let me tell you something. Most of us are lazy on the Internet. Why would you type in www.bing.com when you could get away with typing bing.com? That's four letters fewer that you have to type every single time. I know it is not television and it is a lean forward instead of a lean backward idea but still, if people can get away with spending less energy, they might as well.

October 17, 2009.

Yes, that's today's date where I am. If it is after 2005 and you have not configured your website so that something.com works in lieu of www.something.com, it is your fault. Not mine, not a squatter's, not your neighbor's. However, even that comes behind the bigger picture: search engines.


Now, I understand your concern. Why, you would say, would Microsoft want people to Google them instead of going directly to their own website? For one thing, they already advertise Bing on Google (so well, in fact that one wonders what their bids for their AdWords campaigns look like. I have read (though not verified) that the average cost is around 80 cents per click (Google does not charge money for clicks it considers suspicious. Lets leave the AdWords/AdSense scaremongering for another day). One can simply type in bing on their Awesome Bar and get to the Microsoft search engine.

So let us sum up:
  1. bing.com works just as fine. People, stop typing in that dagnabbin* www already.
  2. Search it. If it is worth its money, it will be on the first page. No, people will not mind if they see you using Cuil, although it is kind of strange if you ask me. 
  3. Get a better browser! A modern browser will allow you to search directly from the location bar or from a search bar close to the location bar. Microsoft's Internet Explorer (7 and above)**, Mozilla Firefox (and its derivatives), Google Chrome, Apple's Safari***, K-Meleon, and Opera have this in common.

* Thanks to Taylor Weaver (585699309 on fb) for the awesome new word. 
** If you still use IE6 or below, please upgrade your browser experience with getfirefox.com I understand it is not possible for everyone. If you cannot, just be very careful of any website (including this one) and remember, it is not paranoia if the threat is real. 
*** Saying Chrome originates from safari is like saying men originate from Macaques but that's a story for another day. Google Chrome uses the same webkit base but it is not a Safari derivative. 

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