Microsoft launches desktop rival to Google
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The battle for search-technology supremacy extended to new front today when Microsoft launched a tool for finding files stored on personal computers.
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The Google vs. Microsoft technology war does not seem to let up. The latest salvo from the MSN camp is a beta edition of its new MSN Desktop Search application.
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(InfoWorld) - Google's claims thatÂ Microsoft's built-in Vista desktop indexing and search tool violates its antitrust agreementÂ could be difficult to prove even if the software does slow down the performance of Google's competitive Google Desktop offering. As long as a user can run alternative software to Microsoft's Instant Search software, it's unlikely that U.S. federal antitrust officials would consider coming down on the software giant, analysts and users said. Google's claims are far different than the ones posed by Netscape during the browser wars that led to the Department of Justice's antitrust suit in the 1990s, said Rob Helm, research director at Directions on Microsoft. "Microsoft beat Netscape in part by leveraging its relationship with PC manufacturers," he said. "This is a lot subtler." Google seems to be alleging that "if two pieces of software don't play together, then it must be an anticompetitive tactic of Microsoft's," Helm said. "I don't recall any past antitrust cases asserting something so broad," he said. The presence of Microsoft's Vista desktop search could be slowing down Google's product merely as an accident of product design, not because of any malicious intent by Microsoft, Helm said. "Even if Microsoft's software was perfectly written, the way Google interacts with it might be bad, and either company might be at fault," he said. "They could have both done the right things in different ways that might conflict with each other." According to a report in The Wall Street Journal Monday, Google sent a white paper to U.S. federal and state antitrust officials in April to try to convince them that Vista makes it difficult for consumers to use rival desktop search software. In its white paper, Google claims that Vista's search boxes and bars -- available in several places in the OS, including the Start menu and in the Windows Explorer file manager -- work only with Microsoft's search and indexing tool. The company also said it is nearly impossible to turn off Vista's indexing, which means a competitor must add a second indexer that slows down a PC. Google spokesman Ricardo Reyes confirmed the company's charge against Microsoft Monday. Microsoft is disputing Google's charges and said that it has worked closely with federal officials to ensure its Vista OS, released to consumers in January, fosters rather than inhibits competition in the area of desktop search. Users can disable Vista's desktop search service, but the company has not made it simple for them to do so, acknowledged Jack Evans, a Microsoft spokesman. He said this is because the company designed Vista's desktop search specifically "to not affect performance and back off any other programs running" -- including any third-party desktop search software -- in a way that should resolve any claims of anticompetitive behavior, Evans said. Andrew Brust, chief, new technology of consulting firm Twentysix New York, said he used Google's desktop search when it first came out but switched to Microsoft's product when it became available for Windows XP because he preferred it. "Microsoft chose to integrate into Windows, whereas Google decided to be browser-based," he said. "Plus, at least back then, Google installed its own local Web server as part of the product and I really didn't like all that baggage. Microsoft's was just more useful." Brust, who has used Vista in beta form, said integrating desktop search into Vista is "common sense" and suggested that Google's complaints might be sour grapes over Microsoft's own antitrust charges against the search vendor when it unveiled plans toÂ purchase online advertising and marketing powerhouse DoubleClick. Samir Bhavnani, research director for analyst firm Current Analysis West, said that Microsoft's integration of desktop search into Vista was a response to Apple's inclusion of desktop search in their Mac OS, not a move against Google. He said it wouldn't be fair for Google to accuse Microsoft of being anticompetitive without leveling the same charge at Apple. However, Helm contradicted this reasoning and said that Apple was not found in a U.S. court to have a monopoly on PC OSes, while Microsoft was in the DoJ case. "I don't have the impression that Google is worried about Apple," he said.
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Google Desktop Search Has Launched  Google quietly launched its Google Desktop Search today and a slew of bloggers have tested it, reviewed it, and are currently testing it, including yours truly. Google Desktop is a frightfully fast application which searches desktop documents, web browser history, and chat room conversations (in AOL's ...
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WITH GOOGLE nipping at its heels, Microsoft has just released a beta edition of its new MSN Desktop Search application. Like Google&#39;s very similar product, Desktop Search builds an index of documents and e
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All the major Web portals seem to be rushing delivery on one product this holiday: desktop search software. Microsoft plans to introduce a test version of its desktop search application in the coming days, meeting its stated deadline by a nose.
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Google Inc.  on Thursday rolled out a preliminary version of its new desktop search tool, making the first move against its major competitors in the race to provide tools for finding information buried in computer hard drives.
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Microsoft&#39;s MSN has unveiled desktop-search technology, entering a hotly contested race to dominate information access on the PC.
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The Redmond, Washington-based software allows the user to quickly locate files on personal computers -- just like Google&#39;s two-month-old rival product.
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LONDON - Google is taking the fight straight to MSN after launching a beta application that allows users to search the web and their computer files direct from their desktops.
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Desktop Searches are nothing like buses. Not even buses arrive five at a time. But with Ask Jeeves and Microsoft both launching new desktop searches to rival Google&#39;s, and with Yahoo!
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MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.  - Google Inc. GOOG.O on  Thursday rolled out a preliminary version of its new desktop  search tool, making the first move against its major  competitors in the race to provide tools for finding  information buried in computer hard drives.
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A new battle in the multibillion-dollar online search war begins today as software giant Microsoft unveils a test version of its new search engine, looking remarkably like one of its chief rivals, Google.
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Google&#39;s Desktop Search application, released as a preview this month for Windows XP and 2000 PCs, searches the hard drive of your PC using the same algorithms that have made its Internet search engine fast, accurate and popular.
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Microsoft (Quote, Chart) officials announced the release of its own desktop search application Monday, hoping to make up Google ground established two months ago.
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SAN FRANCISCO (CBS.MW) -- In its bid to displace Microsoft in controlling the desktop, Google on Thursday unveiled its long-awaited desktop search toolbar.
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Google Inc. plans to launch a Linux version of Google Desktop on Wednesday, almost three years after the product&#39;s launch for the Windows operating system.