I could see Bing getting up to a potential 20% (blatant guess) market share, perhaps until dropping down and settling at around 16-18%. Current Bing just passes 10% market share.

Bing, Microsofts new search platform, with is visually appealing home page has some hope to give in competing with Google, however with Google’s advances and investment in search it is unlikely that Bing will make that much of a dent, considering Microsoft’s previous search efforts.

Google Fast Flip lets you browse news articles and the like as if you are browsing through a newspaper. This visual representation makes it quick and easy to look over different articles, without actually having to check out each one until you find what you really want.

It adds a new dimension to search that is very welcome.

Yahoo have lost 15%, MSN have lost 21% and Ask has also lost 21% over last year.

Searchers are also now using longer search queries when searching for what they want on the web. What does this mean? This means that the average searcher now knows (better) how to use a search engine to find the results that he/she is searching for.

Longer search queries are becoming more popular as year over year increases (and decreases) show just that.

• 1 word search queries have dropped by 3%
• 2 word search queries have dropped by 5%
• 3 word search queries have remained stable
• 4 word search queries have increased by 2%
• 5 word search queries have increased by 6%
• 6 word search queries have increased by 8%
• 7 word search queries have increased by 12%
• 8 word search queries have increased by 22%

This means that Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Pay Per Click (PPC) management have become a lot more difficult as search queries become longer and therefore more varied.

Paid advertising using keyword targeting will become more difficult as accounts become larger due to increased keyword numbers. As keyword phrases become more targeted, so too must paid advertising campaigns such as Google AdWords, in order to maximise quality score, reduce Cost Per Click (CPC), and thereby increase Return On Investment (ROI).

HealthBase by NetBase is a health research showcase (read Search Engine) dedicated to medical material. From what I have seen HealthBase appears to be a solid medical search engine and I have already bookmarked it for further use.

On the home page you can immediately search for treatments for a health condition, disease or sign. Lets give it a go.

How about we try “hemorrhoids”. Throw it in the research box and hit enter. Up pops 127 treatments from 307 records. These treatments are listed in three unique categories – Drug and Medications, Treatments, Food and Plants.

Under each category, we are presented with various subcategories. Further clicking on a sub-category will show a list of the top three links with a small but comprehensive summary of what is included on each website. In fact these summaries often appear to be so relevant that one may not even need to follow the link to the website. This makes for a much faster searching (and finding) experience.

Each sub-category can be expanded and collapsed with ease meaning that you can navigate through various options without getting lost in a jumble of links, pages and websites as often happens with a regular search engine such as Google.

The other good (great) thing is that these sources are coming from trusted links. They are not just any old site on the web. They provide valid and up to date information on the topic you have searched for.

At the top of the page, above the research box, are various other tabs which enable you to ‘research’ other areas – specifically causes, complications, and pros & cons. Clicking on each of these tabs will show further information much like the treatments tab, but more specific to your exact need.

I personally think that this search engine is a step forward from other search engines such as Google, Yahoo and MSN/LIVE/BING.

Search Engines such as HealthBase, Decision Engines such as Hunch, and Knowledge Engines such as Wolfram Alpha are perhaps the wave of the future and the true competitors to Google or Yahoo rather than Binghoo or Microsoft.

Discover what weather is heading your way:

Find Local Businesses near you or where you are headed:

Need to convert some units?

What’s on at the movies and what are the showtimes?

How’s the game going:

When does your Cousin’s flight arrive?

What’s the definition of … ?

What time is it in … ?

Let’s make some money:

Need to calculate just how much money you’ve made today?

Ready to rumble?

Convert your currency:

Is it at the tip of your tongue?

Need to track your packages?

What area code is that?

What’s the population of … ?

Find housing listings:

With the ability to search back and forth over days or decades and on whichever topic you choose, it has never been easier to find what you were looking for.

Google News Timeline search on Michael Jackson

You have the ability to view your schedule, add or remove sights and change the dates of your intended stay.

Taking a further look into Google City Tours, the first thing I have noticed is that there is no tour information for Hong Kong, or at least I cannot figure out what to search for. I have tried “Hong Kong” and “Hong Kong, China”, but nothing comes up. Upon typing in “Melbourne, Australia”, at once a 3 day itinerary is displayed for sights across the Melbourne city area.

Melbourne Schedule, Google City Tours

Most sights appear to be Museums, something which doesn’t interest me that much. After removing most museums from my schedule, there is not much left for my 3 day proposed schedule.  Now, you may also add items to your schedule, but the problem is that without knowing where to go, it is very difficult to know what to search for.

In this respect, Google City Tours may still have a long way to go to become more functional and hence the reason for it being in the Labs area of Google – Where new programs are tested and developed before becoming main stream.

I can definitely see a good use for Googly City Tours and look forward to using it in the future when it is fully functional.

As I take a look at this new entity on the web I am quite willing to answer the first 20 questions as I discover what Hunch is all about. I figure that Hunch may be worth signing in so in one quick and easy step the task is done. Here is my introduction to Hunch:

Welcome to Hunch! Hunch is a decision-making tool, built by its users. In ten questions or fewer, Hunch gives you its best hunch of what you would like. Read the FAQ for help, post to the forums for questions or suggestions, and let us know how we can make Hunch help you. We’re glad you’re here.
Now go make some decisions!

Looking at the home page, on first inspection Hunch looks like Yahoo Answers.  You can join in on topics, tell Hunch more about yourself by answering questions, give ratings on different topics, keep an eye on certain activities via a feed, as well as browsing specific topics.

At the bottom of the home page is a ‘people’ section which kind of looks like a match making section – of what relevance this has to a search engine or for that matter a decision engine, I am not sure…

I’m intrigued by the questions which claim to be able to teach Hunch about yourself and therefore give you customised results which will better match any queries that you may ask Hunch. Well, after answering one question, already I am stuck with an error:

Hunch encountered an error.
Please Refresh the page to retry.

OK then, let’s try again. Perhaps it is that everyone has got word on Hunch and that is the reason for it running so slow today – but it is not a good first impression from me. Refresh hasn’t worked and I am proceeding to open a new window. Well, that’s it for me – it seems that Hunch is down. Too bad – I won’t be coming back here in a hurry.

Going on other reviews of Hunch, here are some links of recommended reading – since I cannot access the site myself:

• Hunch: Your “Personal Decision Makr”
• Hunch: A Real Decision Engine

Meanwhile it seems that Hunch is responding again, however it is still very slow. I may give it another go tomorrow.