Hmmm. Let's say that Bing sets up a script that sends queries to Google and then records the results. That's clearly copying. But what Bing does is when you use its toolbar, it watches what you do and uses that information to rank results. Is that really copying? It showed Google's Honeypot page because Google's engineers were clicking on the Honeypot page with the toolbar installed. That isn't copying Google's results, that's copying the actions of Bing toolbar users.

This can easily be demonstrated. Google can set up a second honeypot but instruct its engineers not to click on the link, ever. If it shows up in Bing's results, then Bing is watching what Google returns and scraping its results.

But if the second Honeypot doesn't show up in Bing's results, then clearly Bing isn't copying Google's results, it's copying its toolbar's preference for links.

The entire thing is moot to me. The takeaway in't whether Bing copies Google. The takeaway is that Bing's toolbar is spyware :-)

Let me add some perspective as a relatively highly ranked user (cletus) on SO.

I've seen this kind of post before and frankly it's annoying. The typical template is "I tried to answer 2 questions and didn't get 1000 points so it sucks" or some variation revolving around faster answerers or whatever.

Rather than being a problem, SO is a superb solution for the person asking the question because they do get fast answers.

Compare this to forums or mailing lists which I abhor as a means of asking programming questions. You'll often get no replies or useless replies (eg a bunch of people who don't understand the problem telling you that you shouldn't be doing that or asking you why) or the right answer might be buried on page 17 when the thread descended into an OT discussion on page 7.

There are certainly low-hanging fruit on SO (reputation wise) and people do compete for those. In my case, I used SO to learn things because of the quick feedback loop you got when you said something demonstrably wrong.

Now I barely go there because whether there's something to answer or not is pretty random and I really don't have time for the waiting game anymore. Other priorities now.

But to complain about a system where there are too many people answering questions is, to be perfectly blunt, ridiculous and narcissistic ("what about me?" rather than what about the asker).

Also, the questions are, for me anyway, a lot less interesting. For a lot of topics, they've now been covered. New questions are rarer and cover increasingly edgier cases. So you're reliant on new languages, tools and problems, which doesn't seem to come at the same pace the earlier questions did, which were basically backfill.

Let me also say that there is an art to answering questions on SO. The OP bemoans the quick answer getting the points while you write a thoughtful answer. My response? To paraphrase Steve Jobs, "he's doing it wrong". SO teaches you this.

If the question can be answered in one line, this is what you do. If more comments will add to the value of the answer, explain deeper issues or perhaps help in cases not necessarily directly relevant to the OP but possibly relevant more generally, then you edit your answer as you go, adding as necessary.

And if you think you can't write thoughtful answers on SO, you obviously haven't looked at some of the great answers that are there.

It's embarrassing for Google to complain about this. You FINALLY get a little competition on your turf and you try to make some big issue that, as a market leader, the product you produce is being watched, analyzed and in some ways incorporated by your competitor.

There is no victim here. They are not taking your 1st result and copying it. They are taking the result the user clicked. Obviously you didn't predict that with your algorithm or you'd have always made that the 1st result. Instead, what they're tracking is user behavior, not your raw ranking.

Obviously users give Google implicit permission to track their behavior by using your product. And similarly, by installing the Bing toolbar, they're giving Bing that permission.

This is beneath you Matt and it's beneath Google.

Google should proceed with caution, do they really want to get dragged into a debate about tracking user actions to influence search results?

I had a front row seat for this test. I believe the experiment we ran provides conclusive proof. I'm on a panel with a representative from Bing later today and I'll ask Bing about this directly.

Very classy apology. While Andrew's quickly jumping to conclusions is certainly not something to emulate (as he obviously implies in his apology), his ability to assume complete responsibility for a mistake that damaged a reputation is something all members of Internet communities should take note of.