Microsoft Launches Bing iPhone App... with Microsoft problems

Key features of the iPhone app include:

- Daily image from Bing.com

- Easy to access voice search

- Tips and tricks on the home page

- "Locate Me" functionality

- Ability to add pushpins and save locations

- Show multiple locations on a single map

"Our investments in voice search (you may have played with them on Windows phones or BlackBerry already) continues in our iPhone App and works great for map locations as well as old fashioned web search," says Justin Jed of Bing for mobile. "Just say 'San Francisco weather,' for a quick result, or even say a full address for a map or directions.  Try something complex, like '1 Microsoft Way, Redmond 98052.' (Yes, I know how to get to work.) Hold the phone to your ear and speak, or press the mic button—simple."


"Speaking of directions (ha), looking for a coffee shop nearby? Bing automatically finds your location," adds Jed. "It's also easy to discover a new spot by category such as restaurants, banks, theaters and choose whether you want walking or driving directions."



The infinite scrolling of Bing's image search is said to translate well to the iPhones's interface. There are apparently a lot more features that Microsoft isn't going into detail about, as they would rather have you just download the iPhone app and find them for yourself.

Beware: 3 problems.

1. Using Voice search outside the U.S. crashes the app
2. App doesn't work on 1st Generation iTouch
3. No search results outside the U.S.