Month: June 2007

Friday Five: search engine alternatives

As usual, something significant event occurred earlier this week about which I was oblivious. That event was a day without Google, which occurred on Tuesday, June 12. The idea, as promoted by Alt Search Engines, was to go a day without using one of the major search engines — Google, Yahoo!, MSN, AOL, or Ask — and to use one of the many alternative search engines instead. Since I missed the occasion, I offer five alternative search engines for you take for a spin. All are listed on the Alt Search Engines site.

  • Mahalo. This site is billed as “the world’s first human-powered search engine powered by an enthusiastic and energetic group of Guides. Our Guides spend their days searching, filtering out spam, and hand-crafting the best search results possible. If they haven’t yet built a search result, you can request that search result. You can also suggest links for any of our search results.”
  • GigaBlast, an engine that’s been around since 2000.
  • Twerq. This site is one of the advertisers on Alt Search Engines, and it now boasts 70 new features and enhancements. (How many enhancements can one make to a search engine?) The site, currently in beta, officially launches on June 20, and one lucky Twerq searcher could win a cool thousand bucks on that day.
  • Scitopia, “the free federated search portal to the digital libraries of leading science and technology societies.” This one’s a keeper.
  • knuru, a search engine that focuses on the business sector. “We like to call knuru a research engine,” proclaims the site’s about page. “Using short descriptive sentences, you can find deeply relevant business information from top-tier academic and institutional sources that you might not otherwise have access to.”

Facebook on the wane?

Memo to Mark Zuckerberg:

Not everyone is enamored with the new Facebook Platform. Oh, sure, the grown-ups love it. Jeff Jarvis of BuzzMachine is one of your biggest cheerleaders. “I finally joined Facebook and have become obsessed with Zuckerberg’s creation,” Jarvis wrote in a recent column. (By the way, Jeff, I still haven’t heard back from you on my friend request. Please add me post haste. I’ve got some apps I want to share with you.) Jarvis also points to another glowing review, this one from Seth Goldstein, who puts metaphors into the Cuisinart when he enthuses that “the Facebook ecosystem … seemed to be bubbling up like thick layer of foam over a double shot of Google.”

Both gush about the network with the zeal of new converts.

Then there’s Marc Andreessen‘s recent analysis of the Facebook platform. And a reasonable, thorough analysis it is. Lengthy, but worth the read. Like Jarvis and Goldstein, Andreessen is also a big believer in Facebook. But perhaps because he’s been around for awhile and has seen a lot of Internet innovations come and go, he tempers his enthusiasm with a keen analytical approach. Still, he can’t help but end with a hearty “Congratulations to the Facebook team — big time! — for an amazing leap forward in what the Internet can do for real users and for opening up whole new vistas of opportunities for third-party developers.”

Meanwhile, Facebook’s base — the college students who made the creation such a success — seems to be weakening. Here are a few gleanings from this morning’s Facebook check. These are all comments displayed by UMR students who are in my Facebook network.

______ is disappointed in how sucky facebook is becoming with all the applications. :( *sigh*.

_______ is about to stop using facebook because she is sick of all the new “applications.”

________ joined the group I hate getting invited to Facebook Applications…It’s annoying

________ joined the group We hate all the %&*$ applications!!!

These comments are random and anecdotal. I’m not suggesting that the animus these students feel toward Facebook apps is widespread. But given the viral nature of communications on this social network, this vibe could spread quickly across Facebook and create unsettling tremors.

Take a note from the politicians, Facebook, and don’t abandon your base.