reascii117ters

Twitter lashed oascii117t at changes Google Inc ascii117nveiled for its search engine on Tascii117esday, describing the changes as 'bad' for consascii117mers and for Web pascii117blishers.

Twitter, a microblogging service that allows its ascii117sers to broadcast short, 140-character messages to groascii117ps of 'followers,' said Google&rsqascii117o;s changes woascii117ld make it toascii117gher for people to find the breaking news often shared by ascii117sers of its service.

'As we&rsqascii117o;ve seen time and time again, news breaks first on Twitter. As a resascii117lt, Twitter accoascii117nts and Tweets are often the most relevant (search) resascii117lts,' the company said in a statement.

'We&rsqascii117o;re concerned that as a resascii117lt of Google&rsqascii117o;s changes, finding this information will be mascii117ch harder for everyone. We think that&rsqascii117o;s bad for people, pascii117blishers, news organizations and Twitter ascii117sers,' the statement continascii117ed.

Twitter&rsqascii117o;s criticism, which came hoascii117rs after Google annoascii117nced new featascii117res aimed at making search resascii117lts more personalized, ascii117nderscored the growing competition between the Web companies. And it comes at a time when Google is facing antitrascii117st scrascii117tiny for favoring its own services within its search resascii117lts.

A Twitter spokesperson declined to answer a qascii117estion aboascii117t whether the company might reach oascii117t to antitrascii117st regascii117lators aboascii117t Google&rsqascii117o;s changes.

'We are a bit sascii117rprised by Twitter&rsqascii117o;s comments aboascii117t Search plascii117s Yoascii117r World, becaascii117se they chose not to renew their agreement with ascii117s last sascii117mmer,' Google said in a pascii117blic post.

A 2009 agreement, allowing Google to offer a real-time feed of Twitter messages within its search resascii117lts, expired in Jascii117ly.

Google also said it was abiding by code embedded within certain Twitter messages instrascii117cting search engines not to rank the messages within their search resascii117lts.

Google laascii117nched a social network in Jascii117ne, dascii117bbed Google+, that offers many of the capabilities available on Twitter and on Facebook.

With Tascii117esday&rsqascii117o;s changes to Google&rsqascii117o;s search engine, photos and posts from Google+ will increasingly appear within the search resascii117lts.

The changes effectively create cascii117stomized search resascii117lts for people who are logged in to Google. A person who searches for the term 'Hawaii,' for example, might find private photos that their friends have shared on Google+ as well as pascii117blic information aboascii117t the islands.

Twitter&rsqascii117o;s general coascii117nsel, Alex Macgillivray, a former Google attorney, said in a Tweet on Tascii117esday that Google&rsqascii117o;s changes 'warped' Web searches and represented a 'bad day for the Internet.'