Microsoft has evidently caught on that this is a convenient tool, and has decided to begin offering its own news feeds. A post on the Live Search Blog says:

Now you can have your news delivered to your inbox every day, twice a day, or just once a week. You can get top headlines, headlines for a specific area like business or world news, or the latest stories related to a search you define. You can set up as many different alerts as you want and send them to any email address associated with a Live ID. I’m currently keeping track of Obama’s appointments to key positions, what’s going on in my neighborhood, and of course what the media has to say about Live Search.

To create your alerts, simply:

1. Go to news.live.com.

2. Sign in with your Live ID (or get one if you haven’t already).

3. From any page within news search (like the default page for top stories or the results page associated with a search), click the News alerts link (in the right column).

4. Click Create alert.

Simple enough. Why Microsoft has just decided to start doing this now is beyond me, but for fans of Live Search and Live Search News, I’m sure it is a welcome feature.