You were told repeatedly that your participation on Facebook was no longer optional (but mandatory) and now you have proof.
Bing announced an expansion of its partnership with Facebook yesterday and it’s a doozy. Bing will be enhancing its search results with Facebook Likes. When you search for information on Bing, with “Liked Results” you will now see which of your Facebook friends liked that same result listing.
Bing will also be enhancing its index with Facebook profile search. By pulling in your Facebook friends, Bing is essentially narrow down your list to those included in your own social graph. Bing is even enabling users to take action and add the friend directly or send them a message.
Before the Web’s privacy advocates double-over with worry, Bing’s “Liked Results” surface content that is specifically designated as “public” and linked to a person’s Facebook friends. According to Bing, “This is the same information someone could access by viewing their Facebook network directly, except it adds relevancy by being presented alongside “traditional” Bing search results.” Users will also be notified when the feature goes live and have an opportunity to disable the functionality if they so choose.
The features will start rolling out this week with full features expected over the next few weeks – it will initially only be available in the U.S.
More on the Importance of Facebook available at Website Magazine: