21 Comments What on earth were Microsoft thinking? The Bing disaster.

Article written by Daryl on the 02 Jun 2009

The launch of Microsoft’s rebranded search engine “bing” on the 1st of June has left me completely speechless. Not through admiration I hasten to add but because it’s all been done so badly! This has to be the web equivalent of rubbernecking at a car crash – so please drive carefully.

The first I saw of the new bing logo was via this post over at the imjustcreative blog. I’m with Graham completely, it’s amazing that a company the size of Microsoft would actually sign off on such a badly designed logo. In contrast, take a look at the new logo for Google Wave – it’s pure simplicity in echoing the colours of the Google brand whilst creating a wave with the letter W is a definite win. Look at the logo’s side-by-side and see what you think.

Comparison of the new logo's from Microsoft and Google

The rebranding car wreck doesn’t end there though. Not happy with just creating a shockingly bad logo for bing the designers of this launch micro-site (which I assume is being used to herald the new dawn of Bing to the world) have blatantly ripped an idea from this site: dragoninteractive.com. Of course, it goes without saying that the Dragon Interactive site is far superior in many ways – but why have Microsoft so obviously not invested time in the design of these sites let alone the bing logo?

The 'rip-off' bing micro-site

The far superior dragon interactive site

And then there are the other micro-sites like this which uses Silverlight of all things when it’s completely unnecessary. What also strikes me though is that the micro-sites sitting under http://www.discoverbing.com/ have no clear brand continuity.

Why Silverlight??

Bring back Live – all is forgiven?

What do you think to the Bing logo and Sites? Please feel free to drop a comment below.

UPDATE There’s also this great post analysing the new bing logo at logoblink.com

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21 Comments Subscribe to these comments.

June 2, 2009 12:54 pm Dave http://www.thinkdave.com Reply

Hey Daryl. Good to see you’re joining the blogging pack. Now you can agonise over what to write just like the rest of us!

On the Bing microsite the rollovers are another very badly done element. A bit of CSS would have worked perfectly, but NO, they had to use Javascript which flickers terribly in Firefox. Probably works well in IE6 though…

2009-06-02 14:05:27 Daryl

Thanks for the first comment Dave ;o) I’m a wee bit late on the bandwagon but looking forward to posting some more! I haven’t checked the bing sites in IE6 yet, but I’d laugh my socks off if it doesn’t work properly.

June 2, 2009 1:50 pm John Stack http://www.3bigheads.com Reply

I think the rounded font is very google-like – as this is a replacement for Microsoft Search, I’m thinking it is aimed at the word Google versus Wave.

Rip-offs happen all over the place. On the web, I think it is more like copying previous successes instead of rip-offs. If the aesthetic works, use it!!! Ok, maybe not. I think the splash and logo are less important than getting results. That was the point that Google was trying to make many years ago.

My thoughts overall? I’m glad they’re finally doing something. It should be interesting to see how they might wind in Yahoo content somehow.

2009-06-02 14:05:48 Daryl

Thanks for the comment John! Yeah, I see what you mean about the roundness of the bing font - It’s still below par for a Microsoft logo though imho. As for the copying of the sites - I actually overlayed the microsoft graphic over the Dragon Interactive one, and guess what, they match. That aside I think my main problem with this copying and also the general site design is that it’s all pretty poor indeed.

June 2, 2009 2:00 pm Stuart http://www.ebuyer.com Reply

Lol, Nice one Daryl, well put.

Im almost impressed with how much of a ripp off that microsite is with the pap torn paper effect on it tho.

2009-06-03 08:44:47 Daryl

Thanks for the comment Stu. In a way it's quite reassuring that even the big boys are capable of shonky design.

June 2, 2009 2:25 pm Simon Frost http://www.frostnet.co.uk Reply

1997 called and wants it’s JavaScript powered link highlighting effect back

But seriously…JavaScript? For links?!

As if that weren’t bad enough, disabling JS just produces a “You must enable JS to view this page…” message. Why purposely block visitors to your page?

2009-06-03 08:46:49 Daryl

Cheers for the comment Simon! I didn't try it without JS (my eyes couldn't stand looking at the sites for too long) but that's very interesting to know. Accessibility Fail!

June 2, 2009 2:34 pm Leif Kendall http://kendallcopywriting.co.uk Reply

As a copywriter I’m just horrified at how badly they explain what Bing is. I was totally bored after looking at that crap for thirty seconds. I still don’t get what Bong does differently to Google. I will probably not look at a Microsoft search engine until Bing’s suitably shite replacement comes along.

Why do Microsoft bother developing half-baked turds like this? They could have spent the cost of Bong on recalling IE6 and saving the world millions in inefficiency costs.

June 2, 2009 3:44 pm Jacob http://www.jacobthomas.in/ Reply

Anand Sharma must be really glad now that Microsoft is starting to make ‘inspired’ websites based on his designs.

2009-06-05 09:36:24 Daryl

Thanks for the comment Jacob, I wonder if Anand even knows!

June 2, 2009 10:30 pm Graham Smith http://imjustcreative.com Reply

Well, you already know my thoughts on the subject. Good to see some responses being kicked up about this… all to be ignored no doubt.

After all, Microsoft must know better, so it would be silly for them to even consider that they have maybe really screwed up here.

Depends how much humility they have.

And calling it Bing Live is not an option.

2009-06-05 09:38:40 Daryl

Cheers for the comment Graham :o)

If only the added "Bada" at the beginning - Microsoft might have been on to a winner!

June 3, 2009 9:04 am Richard Dewick – makakman http://www.makakmedia.co.uk/blog Reply

Like your first post Daryl, welcome to the blogosphere! Bing has been a bit of a non event so far and I haven’t seen many positives around. As for the logo…

2009-06-05 09:40:04 Daryl

Thanks for the comment Richard! It's nice to be getting some feedback on my first post (Twitter definitely helps there!)

June 4, 2009 11:19 am stim http://WebsiteURL Reply

as with many things it often doesn’t appear to be very good at first, give it time and the logo will grow on you, it’s actually pretty cool (although i had the same initial concerns too!)

June 5, 2009 6:23 pm Tommy http://WebsiteURL Reply

I am still not completely sold on the Bing thing…it still has much to prove to me before I call it a hit. I will say the the shopping aspect is pretty nice. As far as the unimportant logo…I have to go with Bing. The logo for Wave just looks stupid to me. In some ways, I feel that Bing has much to offer, while in other ways, I am sticking with Google…at least for now.

June 19, 2009 11:30 pm Anand http://dragonineractive.com Reply

The actual site and logo look almost passable, but the discover site?! Looks like microsoft just hired a couple kids who got their hands on some photoshop tutorials.

Then again, worse things have come out of Redmond…

June 20, 2009 12:07 am Alna http://Alanhogan.com Reply

Your site is not the only one with a 3D look to it, though they do look quite similar. And yes the whole Bing brand is a disaster.

Careful with your apostrophes. As much as I respect you as a designer, it’s hard to take your criticisms seriously when you pluralize “logo” incorrectly and use “it’s” as a possessive.

2009-06-20 06:35:44 Daryl

Thanks for your comment Alan. As for my use of apostrophes - can I just ask you a question "did you understand what I what I was trying to say?". But then I think I know the answer to that.

I'll be perfectly honest, I really couldn't care less about incorrect usage of apostrophes as long as the overall message was conveyed in the post grammar is the least of my concerns.

I can thoroughly recommend listening to Stephen Fry's podcasts, particularly the one on language where he shares a similar view on pedanticism. ;)

June 30, 2009 9:55 pm Microsoft Bing Launch | Creative Reason http://www.creativereason.com/index.php/2009/06/30/microsoft-bing-launch/ Reply

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