Microsoft Edge for iOS just picked up a handy new Shopping hub just in time for Black Friday.
The feature helps customers find products, nearby stores, and deals and coupons. It should make your holiday shopping a little bit easier — but it’s only available to customers in the U.S. for now.
Apple just gave Microsoft’s search engine Bing a huge blow today by replacing it with Google on iOS and macOS.
The company previously used Bing search results as the default when users made a search query via Siri on iPhones or from Spotlight on Macs. Bing will still be around in some capacity, but it appears that the company has given in and turned back to using Google.
Happy Sunday everyone! During seven days in which Apple revealed iOS 10 and Mac OS Sierra to the world, developers released some great new apps and updates into the App Store.
From a great choose-your-own-adventure game set in 1979 Iran to a price comparison search app, here are our picks for apps of the week.
Microsoft released a completely revamped Bing app for iPhone today with a redesigned home page and a much larger emphasis on instant answers to search queries. Finding what you’re looking for now takes much less time. It’s possible that this release is a stepping stone to the iOS debut of Cortana, Microsoft’s answer to Google Now.
Microsoft released its list of the top Bing searches of 2014 this week, and among tech companies, Apple appears to be this year’s big winner, again.
The iPhone 6 and iPad both ranked among the top 5 tech search words of 2014, according to BingTrends. Other top searches included Fitbit and the Xbox One, but the iPhone 6’s biggest competitor – the Samsung Galaxy S5 – didn’t even place in the top 10.
Here are the complete rankings:
Apple and Google aren’t the good friends they used to be thanks to the rise of Android as the iPhone’s main competitor. Ever since Apple axed Google Maps in iOS 6, it has been clear that Google’s days in Apple’s software are numbered.
The hardest Google service for Apple to replace is undoubtedly search. Siri is slowly becoming its own search engine of sorts that draws from multiple services like Wolfram Alpha and Wikipedia, but Google has remained the standard for traditional web search.
In iOS 8 and OS X Yosemite, Google is still set as Safari’s default search engine. But with the introduction of more search partners in Apple’s new software, it’s hard to believe that Google search will enjoy its prominence for much longer.
I asked Siri something yesterday, and s/he – as usual – misheard me. Whatever I actually asked, Siri thought I said “Election Tacos,” and as that didn’t really fit in with Siri’s abilities, he did a web search. Only instead of popping me into Safari, the results were shown right on the lock screen. And that’s not all.
This time on The CultCast: Microsoft disses Siri but becomes her go-to search; Apple TV gets better with new apps; new Airport routers get even better; Anchorman 2 gets classier; we answer your Facebook questions; we pitch our favorite tech and apps on an all new Faves N Raves; and… WHEW! Just press play already.
All that and more on this week’s CultCast! Stream or download new and past episodes on your Mac or iDevice by subscribing now on iTunes, or hit play below and may the shwartz be with you.
Show notes up next.
During today’s WWDC keynote, Apple’s Eddy Cue briefly mentioned Bing integration in iOS 7. While demoing new features in Siri, Cue mentioned that Bing is used to power web searches. Nothing was said about Google, and that shouldn’t come as a surprise.
Apple has been distancing itself from Google for quite some time. For instance, Apple Maps is now on iOS and OS X. Bing integration in Siri, while a more subtle move, is definitely a knife jab at Google. And Microsoft couldn’t be happier.
Amidst rumors of a mysterious smartphone and new iPad apps, Facebook held a big press event today at its headquarters in Menlo Park, California. The topic was search, or more specifically, social search. It’s a new feature Facebook is calling “Graph Search,” and the beta has started rolling out already. It will be available for all of Facebook’s one billion users soon.
Think of Graph Search as Google with a more personal touch. Facebook is leveraging everything it knows about you to help you connect with people who like what you like. Instead of leaving Facebook.com to get your results, all of your social data and timeline history is mined and collated inside Facebook’s walls. That’s good news for Facebook, and bad news for Google.
Facebook is set to hold a press event later today, and it appears the whole thing’s going to be a massive kick in the teeth for Google. Not only is the social network expected to unveil its own smartphone, possibly powered by its own platform, but it’s also expected to hit Google where it really hurts — in search. Rumor has it the company will unveil its own search engine, which will rollout to users “very soon.”
Say what you will about Apple losing marketshare to Android and Samsung. The iPhone 5 is still the most lusted-after gadget of 2012 if search queries are any indication of where the public’s heart lies. People want the iPhone 5 more than they want to see pics of Kim Kardashian.
Yahoo released their year in review report on the most searched terms of 2012 and the iPhone 5 came in second place, beating out Kim Kardashian, Lindsay Lohan, Kate Upton, Kate Middleton, and Whitney Houston, while “elections” was the most searched term overall.
You may have forgotten, but Microsoft actually owns a search engine. It’s called Bing. Today Microsoft released the top Bing searches from 2012, and the results include events like the birth of Beyonce’s baby alongside celebrities like Kim Kardashian and Justin Bieber.
Interestingly, the top news story of the year wasn’t the U.S. presidential election or the summer Olympics. It was the iPhone 5. Microsoft must be so proud.
Earlier this morning Tim Cook published an apology letter to all Apple fans for how horrible Apple Maps have been. Not only did he apologize, but he actually told users that they should try some alternatives while Apple fixes their mapping fiasco.
It’s great that Apple is taking responsibility for their shoddy work, but now that they’ve kicked Google Maps out of iOS 6, what are the best alternative? We took a quick look at the alternative map apps that Tim suggested, to find out which one you should use if you plan to ditch Apple Maps for a while. Here’s what we found out.
Apple CEO Tim Cook has today issued a letter to customers regarding the issues they have been experiencing with Maps in iOS 6. Cook says Apple is “extremely sorry for the frustration” the new service has caused to its customers, and he insists the company will continue to work incredibly hard until Maps is fixed. Cook even suggests a number of alternative services users can try in the meantime.
The full letter is below.
Dolphin Browser is arguably one of the best third-party browsers for iOS, and the iPhone version just became even better with its latest update. Version 4.0 brings a stack of new features including Dolphin Sonar voice controls, a URL keyboard, and a night mode — and it’s available to download now.
Microsoft has launched another version of its MSN app for the iPad to cater for U.S. customers, following its debut in Canada, Germany, France, and the U.K. late last month.
Since the Absinthe jailbreak tool was released for Apple’s A5-powered devices last week, we’ve seen all sorts of tweaks that maximize Siri functionality on the iPhone 4S. The latest is one of the most impressive. It’s called Lingual, and it provides quick and easy voice translation to over 30 languages, using Microsoft Bing Translate API.
Apple famously solved the copy-and-paste touchscreen challenge with their innovative hold-and-drag-corners approach first introduced in iOS 3.0, but is there a better way? Microsoft thinks so. They think they’ve got an even better way to copy text in the latest version of their Bing for iPad app. It’s called the lasso.
Microsoft just launched an app for its search engine Bing for iPhone.
Offered gratis on iTunes, the idea is to put a Microsoft search engine in the hands of iPhone users who have shunned Microsoft smartphones.
Capturing the iPhone market might be a way for Microsoft to bump up traffic for the “decision engine,” which currently has about 10% of the US Internet search market.
Wishful thinking? Maybe not: the first 247 reviews, 191 are five star — 77% — though some of the comments “I love this app, it’s a great Christmas present from Microsoft” set the BS-ometer spinning.
Any Bing aficionados out there planning to download the app?
I gave the web version a quick whirl when it first came out, but it didn’t blow my hair back. Haven’t bothered since.
