Gizmodo: search engine

Microsoft's 'Page Hunt' Online Game Helps Improve Bing

Sean Fallon — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 16:20:00 EDT

How good of a web surfer are you? Put your skills to the test with Microsoft's Page Hunt online game. Besides a nerdy sort of satisfaction, your queries will help improve the Bing search engine.

The game, named Page Hunt, presents users with a random Web page and then asks them to input the search terms that will put that page within a search engine's top five search results. Depending on how close to the top of the rankings their queries put the Web page, players are awarded points. In order to sweeten the experience, the game adds animations, a top-score list, bonus points and other "gamelike" features.

It's a good idea, and the game couldn't be more simple. Is it fun? Well, that depends on how bored you are at work right now. At any rate, if you have been using Bing and you want to help to fine tune their algorithm, Page Hunt can help you kill a few minutes. [Page Hunt via eWeek via PCMag]

Microsoft Will Unveil 'Kumo' Search Engine At All Things D

Jason Chen — Tue, 19 May 2009 19:09:27 EDT

The May 26 to May 28 conference will allow Microsoft to show off a search engine that's supposedly more competitive to Google than its current solution. ("What current solution," you may ask, if you're trying to be a jerk.) [All Things D]

Let Me Google That For You Teaches You How To Google

Andi Wang — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 20:55:13 EST

Let Me Google That For You is a tutorial search engine for those whose assistance is constantly needed by the technologically impaired or those clueless friends you have who are just too lazy to search for answers themselves. Follow the jump to find out how it works.

Upon reaching the Let Me Google That For You page, type in your friend's question into the search bar and click any button. The Web site will then provide you with a link to pass on to your friend, which will direct him to a page that will show your friend, step by step, exactly how to Google that specific question. The tutorial ends with an backhanded remark, "was that so hard?" before listing the question's search results. Hopefully your and the tutorial's impertinence will finally push your Google-incapable friends into braving the search engine waters on their own. [Lifehacker]

Hitachi's GazoPa Web Searches Images by Color, Shape

Elaine Chow — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 03:29:08 EDT

Hitachi became the latest company to enter the online search arena, unveiling a “similar image search” engine called GazoPa at TechCrunch50. Unlike regular image search services, GazoPa relies on characteristics such as similar colors and shapes rather than traditional metadata. We're not sure why Hitachi, better known as a hardware company, would dabble in something like image searching, but GazoPa seems like an interesting concept if it works as well as it does in the video.

Hitachi Launches a Trial of GazoPa, a Similar Image Search Service

GazoPa Selected As TechCrunch50 Venture Project
SAN FRANCISCO —(Business Wire)— Sep. 10, 2008 Hitachi, Ltd. (NYSE:HIT)(TOKYO:6501)(hereafter "Hitachi"), announced today that it has launched a trial of a similar image search service called GazoPa as an invitation-only beta at TechCrunch50 conference in San Francisco. GazoPa was selected as a finalist at the conference.

GazoPa is a web image search service that uses features from an image to search for and identify similar images. In conventional image search, users do not find results of image searches to be as accurate as those of web page searches. This is often because some images do not have metadata, some have incorrect metadata, and some are difficult to describe with words. Therefore, keywords are not sufficient as the only conditions for image searches.

With GazoPa, users can overcome the limitations of metadata, and word descriptions. GazoPa enables users to search for similar images using characteristics such as a color or a shape extracted from the image itself. GazoPa even enables the use of users' own photos, drawings, and images found on the web, as search keys to locate similar images from the GazoPa database. Not only does GazoPa support photos but also searches video thumbnails. Unlike video sharing websites that use keywords to search, users can search for videos using images.

GazoPa enables searches at high speed even for large quantities of image data. GazoPa currently searches 50 million images crawled from the web within one second. Since GazoPa crawls the web continuously, it will soon be capable of searching more than 100 million images.

As the number of digital camera and camera phones increases steadily to exceed 1 billion worldwide, the number of digital images that are captured by digital devices also increases dramatically. It therefore becomes more and more important to search for a needed image from a large quantity of images in a short time. GazoPa overcomes the limits of keyword searches and introduces a new world to image searches.

For detailed information about GazoPa, please visit its website at http://www.gazopa.com

About Hitachi, Ltd.

Hitachi, Ltd., (NYSE: HIT / TOKYO: 6501), headquartered in Tokyo, Japan, is a leading global electronics company with approximately 390,000 employees worldwide. Fiscal 2007 (ended March 31, 2008) consolidated revenues totaled 11,226 billion yen ($112.2 billion). The company offers a wide range of systems, products and services in market sectors including information systems, electronic devices, power and industrial systems, consumer products, materials, logistics and financial services. For more information on Hitachi, please visit the company's website at http://www.hitachi.com.

About TechCrunch50

Founded in 2007 by leading technology blog TechCrunch and entrepreneur Jason Calacanis, the TechCrunch50 conference provides a platform for early-stage, and frequently unfunded, companies to launch for the first time to the technology industry's most influential venture capitalists, corporations, angel investors, fellow entrepreneurs and the international media. Companies are selected to participate exclusively on merit. TechCrunch50 is supported by corporate sponsors Google, Microsoft, MySpace, Salesforce, MSN Money, Symantec, Thomson Reuters and Yahoo!, as well as venture capital firms including Sequoia Capital (http://www.sequoiacap.com/) , Mayfield Fund (http://www.mayfield.com), Clearstone Venture Partners (http://www.clearstone.com), Charles River Ventures (http://www.crv.com), Founders Fund, Perkins Coie and Fenwick & West (http://www.fenwick.com).

Ex-Googlers Build Cuil Search Engine, Say it's Bigger Than Google

Kit Eaton — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 05:28:00 EDT

"Search 121,617,892,992 web pages" claims the front page of the new search engine Cuil (pronounced "cool" apparently). Those 120 billion pages are about three times as many as Google actually indexes, according to developer Anna Patterson... and she should know as until 2006 she worked there. Presented in a kind of "magazine style," Cuil will apparently get more pertinent results as it drills into the contents of a page, unlike Google's complex ranking system. Since two more of the development team also worked for Google, and there's $33 million of venture capital behind the new site, it is certainly going to be an interesting development to keep tabs on. Cuil takes search requests from today... though as it can't find me I'd say it needs tweaking. [Cuil via Physorg]

Microsoft and Yahoo Continue To Tango, Re-enters Talks

Elaine Chow — Sun, 18 May 2008 19:30:00 EDT

Looks like Microsoft isn't completely ready to let its dreams of a deal with Yahoo die yet. Despite calling the purple giant's demands "excessive" and retiring its $47.5 billion bid just two weeks ago, Microsoft is now saying that it's discussing an "alternative transaction." Apparently something has changed enough in the last few days for Microsoft to resume negotiations, like a scorned lover lured back by a "I promise everything will be different, baby. I'll really try to make things work this time around!" [BBC]

Google Takes a Lesson From Digg?

Mark Wilson — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 09:07:08 EST

Taking a lesson from Digg and similar sites, Google Labs is testing out a new reader response interface for search results (with only a select few users for a limited time). Essentially, your normal search results are enhanced with "like it" and "don't like it" buttons that would tweak the order of said results on your list. And you can also add URL results that you would have liked to receive given your search premise. Google explains:

When you search for the same keywords again, you'll continue to see those changes. If you later want to revert your changes, you can undo any modifications you've made.

But your poor tastes/opinions won't screw everyone.

The system only works within browser...for now...meaning that your opinions will not affect other users. Of course, if such a system were deployed in a widespread fashion, we're guessing Google would aggregate data trends to alter search results over time for better relevance.

And would such a system be better? What do we trust more, man or machine? Or sweatshops full of children adding "Nike.com" to every query result? [google via theregister]

Gizmodo Japan: Mars Flag

jmanzone — Sun, 07 Aug 2005 02:22:00 EDT

The intarweb needs a new search engine like it needs another goatse mirror. While Mars flag is coming to an already crowded party, it shows up fashionably late and in style. It's killer feature: visual indexing. Enter a family-friendly search phrase like "college coeds," then watch in ~~horror~~ *cough* delight, as your search results display in all their visually indexed glory. -JM

Mars Flag: Gizmodo