Microsoft's Bing Teams With Twitter

Microsoft has picked up a new weapon in its Internet search duel with Google—full access to Twitter's communications hotbed. The partnership announced today represents a coup for Microsoft as it tries to spice up its Internet search engine, Bing, in its long-running attempts to lure traffic from Google. A test version of Bing's Twitter feature debuted today.

If the alliance pans out the way Microsoft envisions, Bing will become the best way outside of Twitter's own website to find out what people are saying in their tweets. It's the kind of information that Google's search engine, far more popular than Bing, can't currently provide. "We think this is one of the first times that a search engine will be differentiated through access to content," said a JP Morgan analyst. Just how much Microsoft is paying Twitter for the rights to the tweets wasn't disclosed. (More Microsoft stories.)