Update: Microsoft has confirmed that they have renewed their partnership with Twitter. The use of the words “bigger and better things” do still hint at something beyond tweets appearing in Bing’s search results. We’ll have to wait and see.
It appears that Twitter and Bing may be working on extending their search partnership agreement, or perhaps further integrating Twitter into other Bing or Microsoft services, as a clearly scripted conversation between the two companies unfolded on Twitter moments ago.
Bing has been integrating Twitter feed data into its search results since late 2009. That deal was supposed to expire later this year, so maybe these tweets are just affirmation of their continued partnership?
The conversation may also be seen as a jibe aimed directly at Google, who in July of this year decided not to renew their partnership with Twitter. Google are opting to integrate Google+ results instead.
There was some speculation during the summer that Microsoft would also axe their agreement with Twitter as they were unhappy with some of Twitter’s demands. These included giving Twitter more control over how tweets would be displayed among Bing’s search results, more links back to Twitter’s site and a larger percentage of revenue from ads that appeared next to tweets.
The full conversation reads,
Hey @Twitter. ^bb
— Bing (@bing) September 6, 2011
@Bing What’s up?
— Twitter (@twitter) September 6, 2011
@Twitter Been thinking about our last 2 yrs together. Instantly tapping into the wisdom of the Twitter community. Good times. ^bb
— Bing (@bing) September 6, 2011
@bing Totally! Search w/o Twitter = old news. You & @MSN are amazing at using Tweets to make search better & help people stay in the know.
— Twitter (@twitter) September 6, 2011
@Twitter Let’s say we stick together and do bigger and better things? ^bb
— Bing (@bing) September 6, 2011
@bing We’re in. Can’t wait for what comes next.
— Twitter (@twitter) September 6, 2011