Facebook begins rolling out Graph Search to U.S. users

The search engine will allow people using Facebook to more quickly find answers to questions about friends in their Social Graph.

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Brace yourself for another Facebook search bar change.
The social-networking giant will begin rolling out an advanced search feature on Monday designed to tap its massive base of 1 billion users to answers users' questions about people, photos, places, and interests. Graph Search, which was announced earlier this year, will be available to users in the United States and others who use the American English version of the site, with access to other languages coming soon, a Facebook representative told CNET.

Facebook Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg announced the new feature in January, billing it as a new way find people, photos, places and interests that are most relevant to Facebook users. By incorporating various filters such as "place type," "liked by," and "visited by friends," users can use the structured search tool to find people in their network and uncover potential connections.
The new tool, which was rolled out to a limited number of users earlier this year, will appear as a bigger search bar at the top of each page, replacing the usual white search bar. Not to be confused with Web searches, which use a set of keywords to come up with results that best match the search words, Graph Search combines phrases to return content from its own audience.
Recognizing that the new tool exposes a copious amount of personal data that members may not realize is available for public scrutiny, Facebook has been working to quell users' privacy fears, including implementing specific search rules that dictate what results regarding teenagers that adults can see.
The search feature could prove key to keeping users members engaged on the site. My CNET colleague Jennifer Van Grove called the powerful discovery tool "smart, original, and a foundational piece of Facebook's future as a relevant social network.

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RIP, WebTV: Microsoft to shut down MSN TV on Sept. 30

The interactive TV service began life in the mid-'90s as WebTV, one of the first set-top box services to offer Internet access via television sets.

 

 

Microsoft is pulling the plug on MSN TV, a service formerly known as WebTV, as Apple ramps up its set-top box efforts.
The pioneering service, one of the first to offer Internet access via television sets, will shut down September 30, Microsoft revealed in an e-mail to subscribers and an FAQ posted to its Web site. WebTV, which was founded by Web entrepreneur Steve Perlman in 1996, was acquired by Microsoft for $425 million in 1997.
WebTV offered television-based e-mail and Web browsing via wireless keyboards but struggled to gain traction with consumers. Microsoft rebranded the service as MSN TV in 2001 to accelerate integration with products such as MSN Messenger and MSN Hotmail.
The software giant even offered the interactive service for free to new MSN online service, but it has largely taken a backseat to the company's focus on the Xbox game console, which also offers Internet access.
Microsoft cited the myriad ways people can now access the Internet as a contributing factor to the service's demise:

WebTV (later called MSN TV) started in 1996 with the goal to bring new people 'online' and to give those already online an easy, hassle-free means of accessing the internet from the comfort of their homes. Later, MSN TV 2 was released with vastly greater power and features. Since then, the web has continued to evolve at a breathtaking pace, and there are many new ways to access the internet. Accordingly, we have made the difficult decision to end the MSN TV service on September 30th, 2013. We are working with our customers to ensure the transition is as seamless as possible.

Microsoft's exit comes as Apple puts more emphasis on the set-top box sector. Apple is reportedly near a deal with Time Warner Cable that would bring new a significant influx of new channels to the computer maker's set-top box, Apple TV, for subscribers of the cable television service. Last month, Apple TV lassoed Time Warner Inc.'s HBO GO and Disney's WatchESPN apps.

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