re Bing Travel - how does a hotel get its url linked to the price vs an online travel agency?

its a good

Would have been great to include some visuals in the post, but congrats on the rollout of the new features!

Sorry - Bing... it's really not good enough!  Maps should be so integrated and useful, but even Yahoo do a better job than this.  My house is about the size of a thumb tack on Google I can get a allbeit blurry images of my roof top to fill my screen.

You've got to let us scroll right in, even if the image is low res.

Overall I am really not taken by Bing... I wonder if you'll let me post this comment.  It all seems to be hype and no subsctane... just look at the design of this page, hardly inspiring.

If Microsoft want to make a difference do something new like Google Wave, Silverlight just doesn't cut it!

Hi Guy - of course we'll let you post a comment. It's your opinion, we respect it and we take all sorts of feedback to our product teams in an effort to make or products and services better and better.

The full experience for the UK has yet to be released. This Silverlight version is a US beta version so we're just giving you an idea of what's coming down the pipe. Still use http://www.bing.com/maps in the UK.

As the website says: www.microsoft.com/silverlight - "Silverlight is a cross-browser, cross-platform and cross-device browser plug-in that helps companies design, develop and deliver applications and experiences on the Web."

Google Wave is "an online tool for real-time communication and collaboration," so we're not comparing apples with apples here.

You can find a UK specific intro to Bing in the UK here: http://www.discoverbing.co.uk

Glad to see you're in this industry - who'd have though the internet would be such a force when we were at school together?! ;-)

The new version of Bing mobile is horrible. It's absolutely, positively not made for units that don't have an "i" in front of the name phone. The old version had easy to use icons. It had an icon for finding movies, gas, traffic, and weather. This new version has....I have no idea since the words are hidden behind a useless picture of a mountain. Plus it's text which is harder to choose than icons on a HTC Tilt 2.

I had forgotten my dedicated GPS at home and I needed to find a hotel I've never been to. I had the old version 4.6.6169.0 installed on my unit. I decided to use the speak feature to  find the hotel. I said Embassy Suites Hilton in Seaside, CA. To my amazement it found it without a problem. I was able to route from my location and look at the map view. When driving I was able to zoom in and use "track via GPS." While driving it showed how far I was until the next exit. It worked pretty well and I got to the location without a problem.

I installed the new version and tried to find the same hotel from a different location. I tried at least 5 times to find the hotel and it couldn't find it. I finally just entered the address manually and routed it. It was the most useless GPS experience I've ever had. Not only is the little Bing DOT useless where it doesn't show which way I'm going, it doesn't scroll the map, nor does the directions change. I had to change both of those manually. Then, to add insult to injury, on the Tilt 2 with the screen in landscape mode, the map is tiny and the useless MS menu is huge and the direction box hid the rest of the top of the screen. Totally useless.

Lucky for me I still had the old version to install. I reinstalled that and used it to go home. This upgrade was a horrible upgrade and more like the original Beta for Bing was released in its place. Terrible, terrible upgrade.

Hi Nathan,

Thank you for your feedback about the new Bing app. We take customer feedback seriously, and we’ll make sure our engineering team sees your comments. We’ll continue to make improvements on the app in coming months, and detailed information like this helps guide us in the right direction.

The Bing for mobile team

feedback.discoverbing.com/default.aspx

I agree with Nathan.  This is a terrible disappointment.  The previous version allowed tracking by GPS and would give turn by turn written (a disappointment,should be spoken) directions including distances.  On this version, I can't even convince the maps to find my location, much less track me on a route.  Find location is terrible.  I can't look up an address from my contact list and get directions to it without manually entering it.  Overall, Google Maps beats you hands down.

Nathan and Brad are so right. The new version is a nightmare. You can't read anything, you don't have anymore the easy to access icons and worse the turn by turn direction don't move to the next turn automatically once you pass a turn when it was in the previous version; By the way I agree with Brad, direction should be spoken. Those changes make this software that had always been the best, now worse than the one of the competitor starting with a "G" . Dear Bing for mobile team I understand that you want to reach the "i" device users but please let the other using the "Windows Mobile" OS enjoy the version that was adapted to their device.

Nathan, Bing for mobile team, can someone post the link to reload the old version?

I haven't tried Bing mobile yet, but overall, I do like Bing and I mostly use it than Google now.  I'm pretty much dedicated to Microsoft haha.

Love the Bing toolbar. Thanks for releasing. I think the look and feel of bing is so user friendly and easy to navigate. I would really like it if a keyword based analysis tool was released. Keep up the good work.