America economy is so dependent on finding new ways of doing things that companies are embarrassed when it is not their strategy. An advertisement for the Post Shredded Wheat ironically acknowledges the point, saying that the cereal is the same as it’s more than a century, with the slogan, “We put the” no “in” innovation. ”

Similarly, when The Wall Street Journal’s All Things Digital conference of technology, last week the launch of the product that generated the most buzz is mature from a company trying to play catch-up on a key technology. Microsoft has launched its new search engine, to be called Bing, with self-depreciation that video began with the “Star Trek” theme song and the words, “Search: the final frontier. Daring to go where someone had gone before. ”

This person is Google, which dominates Web search that “google” has become a verb meaning “to search for information.” However, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said, “Research has not been a dynamic category in terms of innovation.”

This is a big challenge for Google and No. 2 search engine Yahoo. After all, research has changed how we gather information and, when it works, find knowledge. It was a little over a decade, as people have started going online to seek information rather than print directories, encyclopedias and indexes. It is impossible to overestimate how we’ve become dependent on the Web and its search engines to find information.

Microsoft said Bing, who will live on Wednesday, will distinguish itself from Google and Yahoo, focusing on providing answers, not just the results of research showing the potentially relevant links. Microsoft says it has built a decision engine, designed to empower people to increase awareness and knowledge on the Web, moving more quickly on important decisions. ”

The objective is to understand what you are trying to learn and find answers in addition to the categorization of results. Bing is another approach, for example, to search for evidence against the search, for example, searches for the best price for a new camera.

Search has come a long way, but the fact that its history is so brief that suggests May still have a long way to go. The first review appears in the Google Search Engine Report newsletter, in August 1998. Expert Danny Sullivan says: “Many people will be happy with the results as the search for” Bill Clinton “to achieve the White House Web site and the first result for” Disney “make Disney.com – results are now obvious. (Mr. Sullivan has also asked a young whether Google Larry Page should never become a commercial site. Answer: “We are doctoral students. We can do whatever we want.”)

One of the most impressive of Google is how it’s done without much competition. About two thirds of research in the United States are now through Google, a fifth through Yahoo and fewer than one in 10 by Microsoft.

More great innovation from Google May be the way it analyzes the data to make its services. This includes closely monitoring the research to provide the most relevant ads to maximize revenue, which was $ 21 billion last year. His domination of research means it has more data on what is sought, found and used all the other engines combined. Its statisticians do endless correlations and modeling. This virtuous circle would be difficult for anyone to challenge it.

Yet, companies take this challenge. Earlier this month a new search engine launched Wolfram Alpha, which has a very different approach. It calls itself a “calculation engine of knowledge”, and produces surprisingly accurate answers to complex questions by analyzing databases. Instead of searching the Web, it combines data from many authoritative sources in areas such as science, mathematics and finance, which are selected and controlled by its drafters. People find value in May and more reliable sources of trust and authority that the results not on the Web filtered.

Another recent launch, Topsy, research on Twitter and theologians in real time the evolution of the site of 140-character posts.

Consumers decide whether Bing, Wolfram Alpha Topsy amount or a better mousetrap. Microsoft gets credit for its goal of helping people “more easily navigate through the information overload that has come to characterize many of today’s search experience.” As Mr. Ballmer said “Most of the world thought it would be nice to have more competition and efforts to research.”

It is difficult to imagine a more useful space for innovation in the information world that improving the search. This is the first place, we are looking for information on the Web and the Web became the first and often the last place we look for answers. However, the race for the best search engine, the Web will be a better place for the competition.

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