Bing has introduced its new look for its search offering today. It will be rolling out to US users over the coming weeks and the m.bing.com search option for mobile devices will be getting it as well. From the Bing blog

The new Bing introduces a brand new information architecture with a three column design that focuses on bringing you information from the web to help you take action and interact with friends and experts without compromising the core search experience.

Sounds like an interesting take. Here’s Bing’s video presentation with Director of Bing Search, Stefan Weitz. It’s a little longish but worth the look so you get the tour of the new Bing and the theory behind it.

Before I go into any discussion here I will admit that I use Google for about 99.9% of the searches that I do. I can’t say it’s because Google has better results than any other search engine because I honestly don’t take the time to compare. Instead I am one of millions, or more likely billions, here on the planet that have developed a Google habit. Having quit smoking a long, long time ago I can tell you that Google might be a more powerful addiction.

So the new UI changes by Bing are of interest but it’s not like I can compare my past experience with the engine to the “new” look. Here’s what Bing has to say from its blog post of today.

Overall, the results that Microsoft shared yesterday from their 3rd quarter efforts were good. Overall, revenues were up 6% to over $17 billion and net income was just over $5 billion. All in all, pretty darn good.

It appears that in order to fund the company’s efforts in the online world moving forward this performance will need to continue. You see, the online unit lost $479 million in the quarter. But hey, that sure beats the fact that last year’s Q3 results netted a $779 million loss so this quarter is really a good thing. Check out this slide from the Microsoft announcement.

I understand that you have to try to make things sound good even when they aren’t quite that way. But Microsoft consistently produces quarterly losses in their online efforts that are measured in large percentages of $1 billion. That can’t go on in perpetuity can it?

I read something this morning that surprised me a bit. Of course, reading something that surprises you is the impetus to tell someone about what surprises you so maybe this is just a time where I am taking the bait. Oh well.

AdAge has come out with their 2012 Spring Edition Pop Thermometer. It’s an interesting look at several areas including sports celebrations, creative director’s glasses, political props and more. AdAge then ranks which things are trending, trailing or tired. It’s fun to consider. The last category, however, really jumped out. It was “Search Engines” and the results were

Google tired? Certainly made me think a bit because on some levels it makes sense. As a way to see why Google may be viewed as tired there was this description of DuckDuckGo and why it’s trending.

Google has posted a laundry list of items that they attended to regarding search in March of this year. In fact the total list comes to 50 changes. You can read them all here at the Inside Search blog for Google.

Google calls these monthly posts started in December of last year “Search quality highlights” and they are indeed that. They are also one of the many ways that Google is trying to do a CYA with so many vultures hovering to try to get the search leader to be more transparent or else they will be seeing them in court. With the EU breathing down their neck because of the Microsoft led charge of the FairSearch efforts, Google is in need of looking as un-mysterious as possible.

Facebook v. Google is no longer a David v. Goliath story. In fact, it is far from it except in one area: search. Search has been and is likely to continue to be the domain of Google. In fact, if Google is to truly survive it has to keep its position as the search king since many of their other efforts either fall flat or just kind of exist without truly impacting the market.

So if you are Facebook where could you grow and tap into a proven ad model like keyword driven PPC? Search of course. The rumor is that they know this and are moving forward to develop the idea. They are even using former Googlers to do it. Bloomberg’s Businessweek reports