Denizens of the web may not be completely familiar with the competitive edge offered from each search engine, but – yes, believe it or not – there are plenty of reasons to use a non-Google search engine. Those who want to avoid spam at any cost should use Blekko, those interested in entertainment stories should visit the Yahoo! home page, and those interested in travel should check out Bing. Bing’s travel services are impressive, and their Bing Maps tool lies at the center of it all.

Bing Maps has long been one of the most attractive map presentations on the web, having once used Silverlight (the Microsoft equivalent of Flash) but having since moved to the more accessible HTML 5. Unlike Google, whose map is basically “what you see is what you get,” Bing has included a number of Map Apps (say that ten times fast) to enhance the user experience. The problem with all the Bing Maps features is that they were spread all over the page.

Well, no longer! Bing has created a new interface which is being rolled out globally right now. This new interface gathers all those links, features, and core options that once meandered across the page, and puts them front and center above the map. Several feature sets have been compiled to drop-down menus, and all items have labels written in plain English.

Further, users can access one new feature: auto-centering of the map. As long as your browser is compatible with the W3C Geolocation API (which all modern browsers – e.g., Firefox 3+, Chrome 9+, IE9+ – are compatible with) and you give Bing permission, you can have the map automatically center on your current position by clicking the pin button at the top-left of the map.