Baidu Launched New Homepage - More Sociable
Chinese search engine Baidu.com launched its new homepage last month. The major changes are the inclusion of the login link on the top right corner (which is similar to Google’s) and a link to Baidu Space (which is a popular social networking space rolled out last year).
It is suspected the changes are to make Baidu a more sociable portal, besides simply a search engine. This is exactly where the Chinese online population culture and Baidu are moving towards. Find out more on this topic from my previous post Baidu Moving Towards Social Search. However, comparing to other Chinese search engines’ home pages which are stuffed with flashy and moving ads, Baidu’s approach is still to focus on simplicity and better usability.
Since the launch of Baidu.com in 2001, there have always been accusations that Baidu’s homepage is a copy of Google’s idea. Read more on the 10 facts about Baidu.
The changes will certainly make Baidu more popular among the local population. The simplicity of Baidu’s appearance makes it more endearing to net users and is conducive in doing extensive searches because the user is not bombarded with flashy ads that are distracting.
I was actually wondering how one goes about being indexed and included in Baidu.com? I have heard that one must pay. Do you know how one would go about doing that? Thank you.
[...] pointing to popular Google vertical sites in China have been added. Back in the beginning of 2007, Baidu’s homepage decided to go for a cleaner and simplier [...]