Comments on: Bing and Kayak: Can You Tell Them Apart?

By: Bob Doran

Bob Doran — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 21:50:36 +0000

My wife just now went to Bing to do some price comparisons on airfares. The travel search seems to have been removed. I haven’t found mention of this anywhere on the web. Does anyone know what happened? Was the Kayak-like search function perhaps pulled because of a threatened lawsuit?

By: Jim S.

Jim S. — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 22:58:33 +0000

They are sort of similar, yes, but I think they are both just trying to lay out nearly identical information in a sensible way. I don’t see that there is a problem there.

By: dnball

dnball — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 14:34:22 +0000

“Data” is not protectable (i.e., exclusive to one person) under either copyright or trade dress law.

As for the “format” of the fare results, it is a simple list. The risk of embracing simplicity is that you will be copied — and that is how it should be. The right to sell a metal box sitting atop four rubber wheels and having an engine and windows and a hole for fuel input belongs to everyone, NOT just the first car manufacturer.

It is irrelevant that other websites that offer travel services publish webpages that show fare results in a different way. While that does demonstrate an “alternative” to a simple list, the alternative speaks to the creativity of those website owners — and to the lack of creativity by Kayak.

By: Top Posts « WordPress.com

Top Posts « WordPress.com — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 00:54:41 +0000

[...] Bing and Kayak: Can You Tell Them Apart? As a longtime Kayak user, I was shocked when I first saw Microsoft’s (s msft) new Bing travel site. The pages of [...] [...]

By: Ryan

Ryan — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 21:59:25 +0000

Really? There is a ton of data on that page, and it has the same layout. Go compare it to expedia or some other travel site and see how similar it is to these sites.

By: thegeniusfiles

thegeniusfiles — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 21:43:32 +0000

I thought it was odd that Microsoft seemed to be innovating… turns out they are just ripping off someone else’s ideas. Microsoft has plenty of money to buy other people’s ideas… to steal them is inexcusable. Take M$ to court for the win, Kayak!

By: Randy Stewart

Randy Stewart — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 21:34:24 +0000

@artruro as an entrepreneur, you’ve got decisions to make like, “looks like we’re about to hit a recession, should I take M$’s money?” or “revenue is in decline, should we sue our recently acquired competitor and see if we can get some of M$’s money, too?” This story wouldn’t be news if Farecast was independent.

Microsoft is guilty of a lot of blatant copying design wise, but Farecast had this design before they were acquired.

By: MattC

MattC — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 18:06:24 +0000

Well I don’t know if anybody here has worked with MS design, but they are the worst in the business. Most of them have no interaction design background and if they do, their experience is with the worst products in the market (Office, MSN…)

By: Sassy Pandaz » Blog Archive » Bing Upholds Microsoft’s Tradition of Stealing Whatever Designs Interest Them

Tue, 30 Jun 2009 17:10:29 +0000

[...] Microsoft’s Bing search engine and travel website Kayak look similar? So does Kayak, and an independent software-copyright attorney contacted by GigaOm. Can you tell which is [...]

By: Bill

Bill — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 15:46:31 +0000

Take a look at the same search from TripAdvisor, though:

http://flights.tripadvisor.com/?airline=&travelers=1&cos=0&nonstop=no&nearby0=no&nearby1=no&airport0=BOS&airport1=LAS&date0=07/10/2009&date1=07/17/2009&time0=anytime&time1=anytime

Clearly the same information, still organized similarly, but no consumer is going to mistake one for the other or carry over perceptions of the Kayak brand to the TripAdvisor site (as is the case with Bing’s duplication)

By: Ian Morison

Ian Morison — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 15:44:18 +0000

Are folks here forgetting that Microsoft has never done anything original in their entire corporate existence? I’m not a knee-jerk Microsoft basher, but come on — they have a history of just copying others. At least when other companies steal, they try to improve on things.

By: Raindeer

Raindeer — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 14:58:03 +0000

OM, you forgot to rip the Google Ads, which was an easy giveaway… :-)

Though of course Microsoft might also understand where the money is and sign up for Google Adwords… would like to see the monthly check for that :-)

By: Artruro Jayson

Artruro Jayson — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 12:34:47 +0000

Correction, the writing credit goes to Jordan. Thanks, Jordan. You, too, Om. ;)

By: Artruro Jayson

Artruro Jayson — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 12:32:24 +0000

Well, if Randy, John and J Khan would read the article then maybe you’ll see why Om wrote it.

For two guys who “are no fans of Microsoft”, Randy and John sure give Microsoft a lot of praise and bullet points over Kayak and the other travel sites mentioned, for advantages Kayak and the other sites already have over Microsoft and Farecast. If Farecast were so “smart and innovative” it wouldn’t have got itself acquired by Microsoft to begin with.

It would not be a surprise if Kayak begins selling everything under the sun soon enough. I may be buying my laptop, smartphone and car batteries from them in a years time. Maybe they’ll start a rival to Twitter and Google? They’ve got a good enough team building environment there to start doing what they want instead of opting to be bought. I hope they’ll choose to innovate and lead as they’ve already been doing. I think they will.

By: Raphael

Raphael — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 06:16:07 +0000

Is it really true that Farecast copied Kayak? Farecast had this design for many years …

By: Alex F.

Alex F. — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 05:18:20 +0000

>>Ultimately it is about the relevancy of the results that search engine brings back to the user that matters

Ironically, they use the same source for flight prices. Any searches, as you can see with the example here, will likely result in similar results.