Are you getting Scroogled?
That’s Microsoft’s holiday spin in its bitter search battle with Google. And it’s pitting Google’s shopping search results against Bing’s, claiming that Google simply returns a series of targeted ads rather than organic results. “We say that when you limit choices and rank them by payment, consumers get Scroogled,” the company says on a dedicated website.
Bing has been accused of the same practices, but Microsoft has thrown weight behind its claims, even releasing a commercial pushing the attack.
Will Microsoft’s effort to cast Google as Scrooge pay off? The company hopes so: Bing currently loses billions each year, and reports suggest Microsoft’s much-hyped Surface tablet is having disappointing sales. “I have a theory as to why this might be,” a CNET tech blogger wrote. “Too many people are searching for it on Google.”
