MSN Search Beta Availability Update

In the process of making our new MSN Search beta broadly available we experienced some technical difficulties that caused the beta service to function improperly or be unavailable for some users for periods of time. We’re working through these issues one by one and you should see service availability and quality improve soon if not already.  We apologize for any inconvenience. 

We expected to find some problems in the beta, and we expect there will also be times when we limit service availability for maintenance purposes.  We want to find those problems in order to help us build a higher quality product, and we appreciate your help in doing this.

A few other notes:

1) Several people have reported problems with the search service and with this blog that appear to be browser compatibility issues with FireFox.  We’re working on broad browser support and have done some specific testing in this area, but it’s clear more is needed.  Thank you for the reports.   

2) When reporting issues, please include as much detailed information as you can in your report so that we can reproduce and fix the bug.  E.g. for browser errors, tell us which type of browser, the version number, and information on any proxy you’re using.  For relevance problems, tell us the exact query you entered, any other special settings you’re using, e.g. via search builder, and the resulting URL you expected to see.

3) The “Help us Improve” link at the bottom of the results page is an easy way to give us feedback.

Thanks

osh