Is a 'Google killer' on the horizon?

Industry leaders to little-known contenders are trying to develop easier ways for Web users to find what they're looking for.

from the February 28, 2007 edition

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But maybe a simpler solution is at hand. Why not let users themselves refine the search process? That's the idea behind Search Wikia (search.wikia.com), a new search engine that Jimmy Wales, cofounder of Wikipedia, hopes to have up and running later this year. Although details of how it will work are still being ironed out, it will be based on the idea that a "virtuous cycle of feedback" from users will bring the best search results to the top and eliminate spammers or other vandals from skewing the results. User-generated features will build on already available open-source search engines like YaCy and Lucene.

Lenssen is withholding judgment, but he is eager to see Mr. Wales's new project go live. "So many people have announced Google-killer products," he says. "But Jimmy Wales is a bigger figure ... he might actually have something."

So what effect will newcomers Search Wikia and Powerset have on the search-engine field? "Probably nothing," says skeptic Danny Sullivan, editor in chief of Search Engine Land (SearchEngineLand.com). "I'm sure we'll see more use of humans" in guiding searches, he says, but don't forget that has already been tried, he says. Remember the old AskJeeves search engine? Hiring human editors to improve results is expensive, he says, so the twist that Search Wikia may provide is that such work will be done for free by volunteers.

As for Powerset, natural-language search concepts have been "a well-used pitch" for years, Mr. Sullivan says. "I'm sure we'll see that come into play, but I don't see it as a Google killer." For one thing, many queries aren't that complicated. Users just want to be directed to a site like "Yahoo" or "weather," he says. A single word will do. Natural- language applications should be able to figure out that if you query "liberal Democrat healthcare," for example, one person you'll want information about is Hillary Clinton, he says. "But any site with [the words] liberal Democrat healthcare is likely to be already mentioning Hillary Clinton anyway."

You need more than just a smart algorithm, Lenssen adds. "What are you going to do with it?" You need 100,000 or however many computers that Google has to be able to serve results to users as fast as Google. "That's a huge barrier to cross," he says. "It might be easier to just sell your algorithm to Google or get hired by Google."

But in 1998, nobody saw Google coming, either. "Google is the leading technology company in the world, or [at least] the most exciting to [work] at," Lenssen says. "But maybe in five years, it will be some other company."

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