Google chief executive Eric Schmidt on Friday said that Microsoft’s Bing search engine was the company’s main threat, not Facebook or Apple.
“While it’s true Web search is not the only game in town, searching information is what it is all about,” Schmidt said in Wall Street Journal interview video posted online.
He described Apple as a well-respected competitor and Facebook as a “company of consequence doing an excellent job in social networking,” but said that Microsoft’s latest-generation search engine was Google’s main competition.
“We consider neither to be a competitive threat,” Schmidt said, referring to Facebook and Apple. “Absolutely, our competitor is Bing. Bing is a well-run, highly competitive search engine.”
I have found myself usually quickly pleased when I have had to turn to Bing after wading through Google pages. Old habits die hard and Google remains my first choice, but…Bing may be better.
Funny, I have just the opposite reaction. After trying Bing and coming up with useless results, I go back to Google and find what I need in the first three to five hits.
Just to add the appropriate Goldilocks balance to this, I use both search engines for one thing or another and sometimes I get better results with one, sometimes with the other. I suppose that’s why Google execs see Bing as a credible and potentially worrisome competitor.