Search is has been a big topic of discussion in 2009, and in 2010 is almost assuredly going to be a bigger deal as users look for ways to distill the internet’s wealth of information to more personal discoveries. Recently, with the surge of social networking, search has become an even more contested topic because the content created by the millions of users worldwide is not just prolific, but is being done daily. Real time search through your networks and contacts postings can be useful to discover what the pulse of your network really is. Unfortunately small steps have been made in this area, and as much as Search.Twitter.com is used, it’s still not giving you a personal search, but rather having you search the entire Twitter network.
There’s a lot of social search options out there, but Nsyght has launched t
Nsyght is a social search engine.
o not just offer up social search possibilities, but also offer up some great discovery methods for new content. When I first discovered Nsyght, it reminded me of an earlier company I reviewed called Worio which was a discovery search engine that had a lot of great social community aspects.
It’s not uncommon for us here at Crenk to come across web applications that do the same thing, the only differences are that some might do it better or worse than another. In this case, the team has come across a very interesting music listening application called TubeRadio.
Once again for the music lover in all of us, this just astounds me. Now it does not have the capability to tap into your own stored music, but as powerful as this search engine is, this could very well replace my Pandora or Last.Fm efforts, even if only for a little while. TubeRadio calls itself the Youtube for music. After you see the video below, you’ll know what I mean.
So what do you think? They search is amazing and very thorough. I’m surprised at how music it can find, and even more so by how seamless the integration of listening and/or watching your music can be. During the video the speaker mentions it being like your personal MTV. Yeah, MTV, from when it used to actually play music.
My experience with TubeRadio has been a good one. I’ve found what I want to listen to, it streams everything smoothly with little problem. In my opinion the only thing really missing is the ability to tap into my own music, but I can overlook that for now since I’m lining up some great music of my own, and of other recommended playlists.
GazoPa is an image search engine that allows you to scour the web for images not by entering a word – but by entering another image.
Its main function is to find similar images around the web to that of the one you entered. It’s like the service currently offered by Google Labs.
You can also draw a quick sketch of what you want your picture to look like and submit it so you get back photographs or artwork. You can then filter your results by colour, shape and size. The search engine will also bring back video content that is related to the images – it. If a picture is used as a thumbnail for a video on YouTube then GazoPa will retrieve the video as well.
Recently, my laptop has been given me some trouble. It got slow and unresponsive and not so much to my surprise, the other day she died – the screen just stayed white and the hard drive just couldn’t live any longer. I guess that’s what you get for working on one computer eight hours a day squeezing every bit of juice you can out of her. Five hours ago I was in the market for a new laptop until I discovered Cnet.com’slaptop finder.
Basically, it’s a constantly updated database of laptops currently available to me and you. You go through its interactive list ticking off requirements for your new pride and joy such as operating system, memory, screen size and other jargon.
Then, after less than five minutes of putting in your needs and desires for a new laptop the system returns a list of laptops with prices defines to what you want. It also allows you to “check prices”. This feature, when used lets you compare prices between top retailers where the computer is available both online and offline such as Amazon.
So for example, as a work laptop I put in medium needs with less of an emphasis on performance as I won’t exactly be streaming HD films from the net. I got a few good models with the pick of the litter being a HP Compaq Business Laptop. A great laptop for a good price of $694 at the California Computer Store. Spot on.
I don’t know where to begin with this one. It was not that long ago, earlier this year, when Cuil was touted as the Google killer. This search engine was to massacre all known search engines known to man, a powerhouse of innovation and usability. There was a lot of hype, some amazing PR, and the world anticipated this amazing release. Sure many of us had out doubts, Google was just so dominant, how could this awkwardly named search engine be anything better. Then again, Google was an odd word some years ago prior to it making its debut.
So just happend with Cuil, and where is it today? Well aside from the fact that the search engine was a miserable failure. Aside from the fact that the search engine was actually crashing sites. And aside from the fact that there were entire sites, highly trafficked sites, that just did not make the listings. Cuil really tried to succeed, but alas, it was a marketing disaster, a sinking ship, a search engine site that just could not search.
The backlash was expected and even became the root of several jokes in the tech community. I personally remember looking for stories on Cuil so that I could laugh. Critics did not hold back anything with their analysis of the search engine, and almost immediately the wind left its sails.
Today those using Cuil are very very very few and far between. With the number of users practically hitting rock bottom, I almost wonder who is actually using this search engine for anything other than research. I’m convinced that only people using Cuil for research on how not to build a search engine are the numbers that are being recorded. I can’t imagine anyone seriously using it for any practical purposes. Perhaps the developers left their computers on a an infinite search loop to give it some traction, but I doubt it.
Alas Cuil, as we wrap up 2008, you will not be missed, but gosh you provided us with laughs. Thank-you!
Searching is big business. Those listings on the right side of any Google search are there because someone paid money to advertise there. Same goes with the top 2 or 3 links. Google makes a lot of money off of these paid placements, which are there based on their dynamic search technology. Google has also come under fire for the way in which it ranks sites, called Page Rank, it is a top secret way they calculate what search results should be at the top for any given term, based on their algorithm that, some have suggested, is based on the number of in-bound and out-bound links from other sites.
Google is the killer app of this decade, no one is doubting that. It is so popular it has become a verb, people just say, “Can you Google this for me?” which is almost impossible to do with anything anymore. So what if a new search engine comes along and tries to flatten the playing field?
That is exactly what Cuil (pronounced Cool) is trying to do. They claim to index three times the number of sites Google does and display them in a three-across pattern. That alone is kind of unique for searches, as they have always gone vertically. They have also implemented tab searches, a kind of, well maybe if you were looking for camera you might also want to look for digital camera. The search engine works, that really isn’t a question, but why should I use it?
Google does so many things now, like simple and complex math problems, fast weather look-up, package tracking from UPS and other services, all the way to stock quotes and word definitions. For me, it has eliminated the need to go to specialized sites if I can just put a special query in the Google search bar in Firefox. Cuil is also missing an image search function, something even Microsoft and Yahoo have worked into their site.
Cuil has some cool features, like roll overs, drill-down menu’s and the tabbed feature mentioned earlier. They are taking on the proverbial 800 pound gorilla by going after Google too. My two cents say that Cuil will have a small cult following for a while but ultimately, this will only make Google stronger.
It’s not uncommon for us here at Crenk to come across web applications that do the same thing, the only differences are that some might do it better or worse than another. In this case, the team has come across a very interesting music listening application called 
Recently, my laptop has been given me some trouble. It got slow and unresponsive and not so much to my surprise, the other day she died – the screen just stayed white and the hard drive just couldn’t live any longer. I guess that’s what you get for working on one computer eight hours a day squeezing every bit of juice you can out of her. Five hours ago I was in the market for a new laptop until I discovered 
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