if search disappears it will be because companies have found a way to stranglehold visitors before they get a chance to perform a search. Apps, tools, gimmicks, email spam, advertising etc... all designed to keep a visitor away from a search and railed towards having money part from their pocketbook using their information of choice, not yours.

Search would be with us forever were it not becoming corrupt in trying to both be a search engine and a shopping portal at once. Every major search engine has a products/shopping section now, perhaps they will ban all searches for products and redirect visitors looking for "items" into their own affiliate offers? I think that's what Stefan is hinting at.

My computer printer searches for ink deals every time I hit print, it's annoying really.

[edited by: Sgt_Kickaxe at 11:42 am (utc) on Apr 5, 2011]

"disappear in the next few years. "

Decade maybe, not few years.

sgt, we will soon need a search for apps :)

Stefan weitz is a day dreamer, Stop making silly stories Mr.Stefan Weitz, Tell Microsoft investors that Microsoft's Bing project is a failure, Don't use diversion tactics. Microsoft team is worse than Google team really! Do you have any proof of what you say?
Even i can say like you that by 2020 there will be no computers.

Reminder to all: Heinlein, Clarke, Asimov, and Wellman. All predictors of where we are now, and done YEARS before kumpters (sic) x-isted. Weitz is on the right track and is upfront. G ain't. :)

I agree with tangor and sgt. And we're closer to Weitz's vision now that many understand. And, it's another case of the smarter players seeing and taking advantage of it. I'm going into a meeting in 20 minutes where we're going to talk about this. A growing, aggressive regional b2b firm that wants to eventually go national with their services. I am not recommending search engine ads or even SEO. Instead it will be blogs, newsletters, LinkedIn, Twitter, targeted online ads (by IP in some cases) and trade shows.

Well, someday it's all going to be about either Spacely Space Sprockets or Cogswell Cogs. So chances are that Weitz is either wrong or right. We'll see.

fun to look forward, harder and much more boring to fix how MSN AdCenter implements negative keywords and language targeting in the present... we all have a tendency to avoid the difficult/real/now, in favor of the easy/later/imagined. but those who focus on the former more, find success today, and will be prepared then to compete for the latter.

Literally everywhere you go, every device you have, everything you touch will conduct a search, whether you know it or not.

Sounds like monitoring and invasion. It's the dream of many people on the marketing biz.

I love it when people say this or that will disappear. I always like to point out that writing on stone tablets hasn't disappeared yet and it's still used for pretty much what it was always used for - monuments, major inscriptions and grave stones.

Sure, not many people make their living as wheelwrights anymore, but in general, stuff doesn't disappear as easily as we think.

He's right in many ways already.

The future of search as he sees it is actually here, and it didn't require much looking in the crystal ball either, because Google has already done it!

For instance, you turn on your Android phone's GPS, and it shows you your location on the map, which prior to integrated GPS would've required you type in your address on MapQuest or whatever.

Now click the filter for "restaurants" and up pops a list of places near where you are, then you can filter again for "pizza" and narrow the results, which previously required local searches or searching with Google maps.

It's still search, it's just smarter and requires less input.

Looking for an open grocery store at 11pm? Just speak "24 hour grocery store" and Google Navigation immediately plots a course. Yes, search just happened to get there too.

So basically MSFT sees the future as Google. Hmmm. ;)

He over dramatized things by saying there won't be search anymore. There will always be exploratory and discovery searches done.

But as others pointed out, search will become more intuitive and it probably occurs on most of our websites. Do you recommend a product to visitors based on a previously purchased product? Or when you type in "Flights, Vancouver to Edmonton Tuesday, April 5th" maybe it also suggests "Canucks Vs Oilers, April 5, 7 PM". These are all basic examples of intuitive searches which present relevant information you that you hadn't quite thought of searching for yet.

What if I just want to have information about root canal therapy? Can Bing read my mind?

Don't know about Bing, but the Great Carnak could... :)

"I see an expensive bill.."

Search is becoming seamless. There is that mass of information being collected by the collectors that allows predictions of results in general terms. There is some benefit for the masses but no benefit for the site owners... and that is where WE are. There might be trillions of pages on the web, yet there are billions of pages so similar as to be indistinguishable---to paraphrase the old WWII documentaries that is "WHY WE FIGHT" to be on page one. Only five will get there. The others are Google products. If on Bing then Eight...

And if Weitz and those at the Chocolate Factory are right only the strong survive. That being the case take your sites down now and go mow lawns, you cannot win. (I on the other hand, will keep on in the desperate hope that I might someday achieve the coveted Number One.)

Hang on a minute, I caught my tongue on my bicuspid when moving it from left cheek to right...

Bill Gates also said there would be no more spam in a few years.. He said this years and years ago.. Now there are more spam than ever..

Tell Microsoft investors that Microsoft's Bing project is a failure,

They sort of did
[bloomberg.com...]

Microsoft sure is pouring a lot of resources into something that will not disappear in a few years.

We need more sophisticated machines and more sophisticated robots.. that would scan everything on this earth and that would scan the everything of Universe as well.

Search is a very curious thing, search engines may become sophisticated, but we need search or 'they' need search.