Free 411 Updated

I mentioned some 411 options in a previous post.



Well there is a new one to mention, which follows yesterday's post. It is Bing 411. You may have noticed that if you call LiveSearch 411, it answers Bing 411. Well, Microsoft has re-branded it as well. The old phone number 1-800-CALL-411 (800-225-5411) will still get you there, but you can also get there via 1-800-BING-411 (800-246-4411).

May as well mention some of the other Microsoft items showing under Bing (The codename for Bing was KUMO - one can also put in www.kumo.com and it will resolve to Bing.com.):

Bing Maps
Travel Search
Shopping
Xrank

xRank keeps track of notable people and puts them in order for you. We count Bing web searches for movie stars, musicians, and other famous people. Then, we compile our findings into an insightful ranking formula that tells you who the world is searching for most. The result is a cultural snapshot of who's hot and who's not!

I already mentioned the search engine (or as MS would call it, a decision engine) and it has many of the options of others:

Web Search
Image Search
Video Search
News Search
Local Search

Of course, you can get news alerts as well via your Windows Bing ID, I mean Windows Live ID.


From Behind Bing:

A new breed of search engine has arrived, a search engine that does more than point you to a set of links. We’ve built a “decision engine” and it’s called Bing. Internet search has become the No. 1 avenue for finding information and getting things done. But with more than 200 million Web sites online (and counting), most search engines are ill-equipped for the task. Not Bing.

Bing provides direct access to the information you’re looking for. Bing organizes search results so you can quickly and easily locate the content that matters most. And Bing helps you harness that information through exclusive tools specific to your key tasks, leading to more-informed decisions. Put simply, Bing is a first-of-its-kind decision engine.

Microsoft states:

"Our research around Bing showed that it connoted “fast,” “easy,” and “delight”

Hotmail was still accessible via the Hotmail.com, when they moved to Live (mail.live.com). Will it eventually go to Bing Mail (mail.bing.com)? We'll see.