November, 2006 Archives | Homepage
Web Surfer's Choice: Cyber Monday or Buy Nothing Day
By now everyone is aware of the Cyber Monday shopping deals which can be found on ShoppersShop.com's Sales and Deals page, on Shop.org's CyberMonday.com page and many other locations including directly on retailer's websites like walmart.com. Last year, eBay was the surprise king of Cyber Monday. Many web users are probably at least checking out the deals and smart organized shoppers are probably making purchases to score deals and save on shipping. Marketing Vox says it was Shop.org that invented Cyber Monday.For people that detest the idea of days like Black Friday and Cyber Monday there is always Buy Nothing Day. Buy Nothing Day was created to counter Black Friday and Thanksgiving shopping and return the original meaning of Thanksgiving. The day has already past but there is no reason you can't celebrate it on Cyber Monday as well. Buy Nothing Day resources can be found here, here and here. Buy Nothing Day has even expanded into a Buy Nothing Christmas. A day for those who don't want to buy anything has expanded into a season for those who don't want to buy anything.
Posted on November 27, 2006
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Google's Custom Search Tool
Google launched a custom search engine tool a few weeks ago that will compete will custom search providers like Rollyo and Swicki. With Google Custom Search you can create your own search engine that searches only the websites you want it to search. You can see an examples of custom search engines at Tech Terms Search, which is a search engine that searches online technical dictionaries; Greeting Cards Search, a search engine that searches for online greeting cards; Petosphere, a pets information search engine; and Gadget Search, a search engine that searches gadget websites. This post on BloggersBlog.com lists more custom search engines people have created. There is also a website that has started a directory of some of the custom search engines. (via Stephen's Lighthouse)Posted on November 24, 2006
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InfoSpace Offers Kid Search at Zoo.com
InfoSpace has launched a new kid-focused search engine called Zoo. The site filters content from Google, Yahoo, Wikipedia and major news hubs like ABC News and Yahoo News. Zoo's site explains they are not a perfect filter.
Here at Zoo, we do our best to filter out sexually explicit web search results. We do not comprehensively filter any other content. Since all filters are not perfect, we ask for your help in telling us if you find any sexually explicit or mature material while searching at Zoo. Our goal is to continually improve the site, so we encourage your feedback— this is your site.Without limiting a kid search engine to only kid-friendly websites it is going to be difficult to filter everything that is inappropriate. Filtering ads isn't the only problem kid search sites face -- ResearchBuzz is also concerned about the way the advertisements are displayed on the search engine.
Posted on November 22, 2006
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Riya Search Tool Offers Image Queries
Like is a new search tool from Riya Inc. that allows people to query via text and images. TechCrunch calls it the first visual search engine and explains how Riya can be used to find products. One use of Like is to shop for items that are similar to what a celebrity is wearing such as Miriah Carey's boots or Paris Hilton's ring.
The Like.com engine takes both text and images as queries, something no one else does. To return results based on an image query, Like.com compares a "visual signature" for the query image to possible results. The visual signature is simply a mathematical representatioin of the image using 10,000 variables. If enough variables are identical, Like.com decides the images are similar.You can see an example here that lets you search for products that are similar to what Paris is seen wearing in several photos. The results are products that resemble what Paris is wearing. You can then adjust the results by shape, color and pattern.
What this means - If you see an image on the web, like a watch that Paris Hilton is wearing in the picture to the left, and use it as an image query, Like.com will return results showing watches that look very similar.
If you enter a text query, like "brown boots pointed toe," Like.com will convert that query into variables in the visual signature and look for related image results. See screen shot below for the results from this query.
Posted on November 20, 2006
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Stikkit Offer Web 2.0 Version of Stickys
A new Web 2.0 site called Stikkit is trying to take the concept of stickys to the Internet. O'Reilly Radar says it provides a "rich user experience."
The basic concept is simple: take notes in your browser instead of scrawling them on sticky notes and tacking them to your computer monitor, your desk, your cubicle walls, etc. But packed inside the simple metaphor of a yellow note pad is a rich user experience. The genius lies in extracting todos, calendar entries, contacts, bookmarks, and tags from the text you feed it.So where is the Web 2.0 site from the real Post-it Notes? There are some programs that have tried to bring stickys to the Web (see here and here) but nothing from the makers of Post-it Notes.
Posted on November 17, 2006
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New People Search Called Spock in Development
News.com reports that a new people search tool called Spock is in the work that will be able to provide a photograph and information about people. The site will launch with 100 million profiles.
Spock, a start-up that wants to make it easier to find personal information about people on the web, has launched its private beta.VentureBeat explains how Spock could help you find relevant informatoin about a celebrity.
Type in a name, and Spock says it can serve up a picture, address, occupation, interests and other information. Conversely, you can type in an occupation and location ("Rodeo Clown, Lubbock") and it will spit up people that fit that category.
Here’s an example of how it works: If you type in "actress," Spock returns results like Google — with listings down a page. In this case, the first entry is Felicity Huffman, who Spock’s engine finds as the most relevant for "actress." (Now, if you type in “actress” into Google, you'll see why Spock has a chance; there are few actresses in the results, except for the annoying site ActressArchives at the top). Moreover, as both Spock and LinkedIn make their profiles more popular, these will rank higher in Google’s results anyway.We won't know how accurate Spock is until it launches but it does sound like a significant competitor for people finding sites like Zoominfo.
Continuing with our "actress" example, you first get a photo of Huffman, but you also get a bunch of tags underneath telling you how she is relevant. For example, there's tag for "Oscar nominee for best actress," and "Desperate Housewives," for which she is well known. There's a "Wikipedia" tag. If you click on these tags, Spock will take you its relevant results for that tag. This gives users a way of searching for information related to the Huffman.
The tag font size gets smaller if Spock's engine detects the tag isn't relevant for the person. So if users create a "sexy" tag for Huffman, the tag may get larger or smaller, depending on how many people agree. Spock gives users an option of clicking on the tag and selecting "yes" or "no." If they select no, Spock factors this into its database. Then, if you type in "sexy actress," Huffman will have fallen slightly in the ranking. Spock has built ways to keep people from gaming the system. If you want to add tags, for example, you have register - one way for Spock to monitor usage.
Posted on November 16, 2006
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Ask.com to Power Lycos
Ask.com will provide Web search, image search, and zoom search for the Lycos Network in a new deal between the two companies. Search Engine Watch has the press release which lists what Ask.com is providing for Lycos.
Ask.com will power Lycos.com's web and image search technology and provide some pay-per-click advertising. Ask.com is a great search engine and one of the most underrated.Web Search: Delivers highly relevant search results through its ExpertRank proprietary algorithmic search technology, which ranks results based on popularity within topic communities on the Web, rather than mere link popularity. Image Search: Combines Ask.com's proprietary index of pictures with ExpertRank and patent-pending image search technologies to deliver dramatically improved relevance and quality of search results. Ask.com Image Search has been touted by some as best of class for searching the Image Web. Zoom Related Search: Offers conceptually-related suggestions to narrow or expand a search query. Zoom related search is placed on the right side of the search results page where most search engines place advertisements. No other search engine has the ability to offer conceptually-related suggestions. Ask Sponsored Listings (ASL) Search Advertising: Provides highly relevant keyword-targeted, pay-per-click advertising. Advertisers bid for placement through Ask.com’s automated open-auction system that also allows marketers to manage and optimize campaigns on Ask.com and its publisher network. ASL sources more than 5 billion queries each month, and supports over 10,000 advertisers bidding on more than 10 million keywords. About Ask.com
Posted on November 15, 2006
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Zooomr Enters Photo Sharing Marketplace
TechCrunch reports that a new photo sharing website called Zooomr is offering more photo upload and hosting space than Flickr. Zoom's free account has 100 MB of monthly photo uploads to Flickr's 20MB free accounts and Zooomr's pro account has 4 GB to Flickr's 2 GB pro accounts. The TechCrunch post also applauded Zooomr's technology.
We've covered Zooomr since launch but I personally have just recently come to appreciate what they are doing. They offer manual and automatic geotagging, picture in picture zooming, and audio narration attached to files, among other things. The Zooomr interface is localized in 18 different languages - that's a big deal. They are doing a great job of innovating rapidly, extending themselves into the world, offering really good value and an engaging user experience.It is always good to see new websites offering new features for the photo community and trying out new ideas but Zooomr does face a couple obvious challenges. The challenges Zooomr does face are that photo sharing is a crowded market with existing players and they may have trouble with people not typing enough o's.
Posted on November 10, 2006
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Amazon Launches Askville
Amazon.com has launched Askville, an online answering service that will compete with Yahoo! Answers, Google Answers and other web-based knowledge exchanges. Overstated explains one of the big differences between Askville and other answering websites.
Probably the most significant change is the flow of the question/answering exchange. In Yahoo! Answers, and elsewhere, answers are shown publicly as they are received; in Askville, answers are hidden to the public until 5 answers have been received. Any discussion or clarification can happen in a public message board attached to the question. After 5 answers have been collected, the group of asker and answerers vote and the whole thing is made public.You currently need an invite to join Askville.
Posted on November 8, 2006
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Yahoo Launches Food Portal
Yahoo has launched a new food portal called Yahoo Food. The new site offers searchable recipes, celebrity favorites and tips, profiles of cooks and local dining guides. Reuters reports that Yahoo has partnered with some major food media companies to provide content for the site.
Media partners include Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia Inc., Wolfgang Puck, Everyday with Rachael Ray, Food & Wine, Epicurious, allrecipes.com, Cook's Illustrated, Eating Well, Taste of Home, and Reader's Digest.(via Search Engine Watch)
Yahoo offers a searchable recipe database, personalised features that remind Yahoo users of their prior searches for recipes or articles on the site, and a potentially vast social network of people united by common interests around food.
It's Yahoo, so search underpins the workings of the site. The technology indexes thousands of recipes via a partnership with allrecipes.com. Users can search by ingredient, cuisine, foods for special occasions, or by taste or mealtimes.
Food joins technology as the first of two in a line of new lifestyle businesses that Yahoo is developing to both drive greater usage of its network of sites among existing customers and woo attractive new online demographics -- the hungry, in this case -- that its blue-chip advertiser base covets.
Posted on November 6, 2006
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100 Million Websites
CNN reports that Netcraft claims the Internet has passed the 100 million website milestone. Net publishing tools like blogging tools as well as small business growth have contributed to the rapid increase in websites.There may be a reason. Netcraft, an Internet monitoring company that has tracked Web growth since 1995, says a mammoth milestone was reached during the month of October.Netcraft says the Internet reached the 50 million milestone marker in 2004.
"There are now 100 million Web sites with domain names and content on them," said Netcraft's Rich Miller.
"Within that, there are some that are busy and updated more often, and that represents the active sites, which are at about 47 or 48 million," he said.
Bloggers, small businesses, and simplicity have combined to create the dramatic growth of sites, much of it just in the past two years.
"The bottom line is it's much easier to create a Web site nowadays, and it's much easier to make money with a Web site," said Miller.
Posted on November 3, 2006
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