Tuesday, March 25, 2008

MSN and Live.com embedding videos in search results

Microsoft's Live.com search has been seen embedding videos in their main index search results.

The feature has been spotted under numerous keyword searches by several of our readers since the weekend. The videos appear at the top of the page (unlike Google's universal search, which still, in most cases, is putting them lower on page 1 or 2 for many search terms).

Is the feature permanent or are they testing ?

It appears to be the first roll-out of the feature, as next to the videos, it does ask "Is this useful?".

Video IS here.

Video is becoming an integral part of search (and ranking in many cases). Our take is that the top of the page takes up an awful lot of real estate and if Live.com (MSN) plans to implement the feature permanently, they should be further down the page.

Video search results have met with mixed reviews. While some users love them, others still prefer text and audio, while others have commented that they simply don't have time to watch them.