Alexa, Bing, Google, and Gmail; Questions Posted for Class

The following post are included here as part of the assignment for class.

What is Gmail?

Gmail is an advertising supported free service provided by Google. It allows users to access their email from any connected device, and since it stores the email on a server you can review past emails as well as new ones from any device, even if you’ve already read the email on another device. Personally I don’t like to use Gmail. I dislike google adding advertising to emails I receive, or adding advertising to emails I send to others. I use Gmail only because I had to have a Gmail account to access google docs for various college courses, and most recently to create this blog

What are the top 10 sites on Alexa?

The top ten sites on Alexa’s Top Sites Page are; Google, YouTube, Facebook, Baidu, Wikipedia, Reddit, Yahoo, Google.co, Qq, and Tabao. With the exception of Tabao, I would consider all of these to be Web 2.0 sites, as the all allow for posting of user content and customizing content displayed. Four of those are foreign sites/services, three from China and one from India. The fact that these two countries have large populations probably contributes to their popularity. The popularity of all Web 2.0 sites is due largely to the fact that most are easy to use, free, and allow people to connect with other who share similar interest that they might not otherwise get a chance to meet. 

Which is better, Bing or Google? My wife and I disagree on this, I prefer Google, and she uses Bing. According to Bing’s own research, found at https://www.bing.com/explore/bingchallenge, Bing is preferred by 56.1% of people who took the Bing Challenge to compare Google and Bing results side by side. This means nothing. Coke is more popular than Pepsi primarily because Coke is sold at McDonald’s world wide. Sales of Coke at McDonald’s alone accounts for more sales then Pepsi sells at all venues. Bing is part of Microsoft, and more people have Windows computers that come with Edge or Internet Explorer, and by default Bing. According to Life Hacker.Com https://lifehacker.com/search-engine-showdown-google-vs-bing-1739263052 Google produces better results when you ask more specific questions, and also gives you better search results for shopping, which has been my experience as well. Chris Matyszczyk, a writer for CNet.com, took the Bing challenge and choose Google over Bing, reporting similar results.