Bing's 'Solid' First Week Good For Online Search

Like almost everyone, I rely on Google first and foremost for finding information online. Yet I'm not comfortable with Google's commanding lead in the search market. It's not healthy, just as Microsoft's years-long domination of operating systems wasn't healthy.

So I consider this (via InternetNews.com) to be good news:

Microsoft's Live Search replacement, Bing, had a solid first day last week, according to one Web metrics firm. Now, a second firm says its research has found that Bing has had a solid first week.
According to a statement by tracking firm comScore, in its first week, Bing increased Microsoft's (NASDAQ: MSFT) search engine market penetration from 13.8 percent in a five-day period in May to 15.5 percent in the period of June 2 through 6, an increase of 1.7 percent.
Last Thursday, Bing was the second-place search engine worldwide, according to net metrics tracking firm StatCounter, which claims to monitor "in excess of ten billion page loads per month [globally]."

Would I prefer it to be someone other than Microsoft? I'm not going to lie. The answer is yes. But Microsoft never will take over the search market. However, what it can do -- and this would be a positive thing -- is provide a bit more competition for Google.

And while the jump from a 13.8% share to a 15.5% share isn't seismic (and could reverse itself), it's good that searchers are at least exploring options beyond Google.