RESTON, VA, December 12, 2012 – comScore, Inc., a leader in measuring the digital world, today released its monthly comScore qSearch analysis of the U.S. search marketplace. Google Sites led the explicit core search market in November with 67 percent of search queries conducted.
U.S. Explicit Core Search
Google Sites led the U.S. explicit core search market in November with 67 percent market share (up 0.1 percentage points), followed by Microsoft Sites with 16.2 percent (up 0.2 percentage points) and Yahoo! Sites with 12.1 percent. Ask Network accounted for 3 percent of explicit core searches, followed by AOL, Inc. with 1.7 percent. (more…)
As 2012 winds down, here’s a video and slideshow highlighting how Microsoft has built its devices and services foundation for the year ahead.
REDMOND, Wash. — Dec. 13, 2012 — If our online searches reveal anything about us, then Bing’s top searches of 2012 show it’s been a pretty epic year. Take a look at what made the list and you’ll be reminded what a momentous 12 months it has been. We’ve cast our ballots in the presidential election. We’ve rallied together against Hurricane Sandy. And we’ve shared two weeks of inspiration with the world during the London Olympics.
There’s no question that it’s been a momentous year at Microsoft. The company introduced the world to Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8, announced its family of Surface PCs, showcased a new version of Microsoft Office and released “Halo 4,” keeping up a steady rhythm of advancements across its most popular products for individuals and businesses throughout the year. (more…)
Winners of the second annual Imagine Cup Grants program, part of Microsoft’s YouthSpark initiative, include student startups aiming to eliminate traffic jams and bring cheap, effective ways to diagnose childhood pneumonia.
MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. — Dec. 4, 2012 — Traffic jams typically produce little more than frustration, profanity, and CO2. Four years ago, though, they happened to give Christian Brüggeman an idea.
He was sitting in a London Starbucks with a friend and fellow computer science student. As they chatted, they noticed that one street outside was choked with cars while another was practically empty.
They wondered why drivers weren’t taking advantage of every possible route. If cars could be directed along less-congested roads, wouldn’t that prevent back-ups before they began? (more…)
Microsoft launches national campaign to alert Americans to Google’s new pay-to-rank shopping search practices.
REDMOND, Wash. — Nov. 28, 2012 — Bing, Microsoft Corp.’s search engine, today is launching a national campaign to highlight Bing’s commitment to honest search results and to help explain to consumers the risks of Google Shopping’s newly announced “pay-to-rank” practice, in which the shopping search results customers see are not true search results such as they see elsewhere on Google; they are actually ads that are ranked, in part, by who pays the most. More information on these practices is available at https://www.scroogled.com.
Instead of showing you the most relevant shopping search results for the latest coffee maker you’re looking to buy mom, Google’s new redesigned shopping vertical now decides what to show you — and how prominently to display what product offers they show — based partially on how much a merchant selling the product has paid Google. Merchants can literally pay to improve their chances to display their product offers higher than others inside of Google’s shopping “search,” even if it’s not necessarily better or cheaper. That’s not right, it’s not transparent, it’s not what you expect from search, and it’s not how we at Bing think search engines should help consumers get the best prices and selection when shopping. Consumers are urged to visit https://www.scroogled.com to learn more about how to avoid getting “Scroogled,” a term used by Bing to describe Google’s new practice that leaves people with fewer choices and potentially higher prices. (more…)
A onetime top 10-ranked “Halo” player, Alex Hebert-Ruiz is now at Microsoft, where she advocates for Xbox LIVE Arcade games when she’s not playing “Halo 4.”
REDMOND, Wash. — Nov. 26, 2012 — Alex Hebert-Ruiz remembers the day she got her start as a gamer.
It was the Christmas she got a Barbie house and her brother got a Nintendo. She was 6, and she was hooked – on her brother’s gift.
“Don’t get me wrong, I loved my Barbie house,” she says, “but beating him at Duck Hunt was one of the great challenges of my young life.” (more…)
States in need of best practices and flexible IT solutions that improve access, quality and efficiency in the financing and delivery of health and human services programs.
REDMOND, Wash., and WASHINGTON — Nov. 13, 2012 — The American Public Human Services Association (APHSA), in coordination with Microsoft Corp., today released the results of a new survey of health and human services departments and agencies nationwide. The report, “A Promising Future for HHS Transformation — The Real Impact of IT System Modernization,” includes survey findings that identify the expectations, strategies and practices that health and human services (HHS) agencies use for the planning, acquisition and implementation of their information technology (IT) systems.
APHSA and Microsoft surveyed 67 agency program leaders from 35 states at various stages of modernizing their HHS IT systems, from those who have implemented solutions for eligibility determination and benefit issuance, case management, and online self-service to those who had not yet modernized. The survey focuses on capturing the agencies’ experience with organizational transformation planning efforts, the agencies’ system life-cycle challenges, and the impact and benefits the agencies experienced from IT modernization. The results revealed that with dynamic executive leadership, due diligence and solid program management practices, departments are seeing incremental benefits expected of IT modernization, but a number of challenges remain. With those challenges, a bright path exists to achieve the desired business benefits for transformation through the promise of today’s technology. (more…)
Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer was in Europe and Israel last week to showcase Microsoft’s wave of newly updated products, including Windows 8, Windows Phone 8, and Surface with Windows RT. He reinforced to customers, developers, students and others that the company is moving into a new era.
REDMOND, Wash. – Nov. 13, 2012 – World, meet Windows 8, Windows Phone 8, and Surface. Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer last week took Microsoft’s wave of new products on the road, visiting Europe and Israel.
He said the launch of Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8, an upcoming new version Office, and updates to the company’s Xbox platform—all part of the biggest wave of updates in the company’s history—signify that Microsoft has entered a new era. (more…)
New software and services enable businesses to create and enhance mobile strategies
ARMONK, N.Y. – 09 Nov 2012: IBM today unveiled a suite of new software and services that enables global organizations to build a comprehensive mobile computing strategy – from securing and managing devices, to creating mobile applications and analyzing data. These new offerings are part of a move by IBM to capitalize on the growing market opportunity for mobile that is expected to drive $130B in revenue for the IT industry by 2015, according to a recent study.[i]
As organizations increasingly view mobile computing as the next platform to conduct business, the market is evolving beyond just the device. Business leaders including the chief information officers (CIOs) and increasingly chief marketing officers (CMOs) of global organizations such as airlines, retailers, governments and healthcare providers are among the businesses turning to IBM to ensure mobile services and solutions are readily available to constituents and in full compliance with IT strategies. They need solutions that can be applied across any mobile environment and device — whether a laptop, smartphone or tablet — and can provide an underlying IT infrastructure that is always available, secure, effectively manages data, and integrates both front and back-end systems. (more…)
