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Founded in April 1996, Alexa Internet grew out of a
vision of Web navigation that is intelligent and
constantly improving with the participation of its
users. Alexa's version 1.0 toolbar was first released
in September of 1997. The toolbar featured Site
Information, Related Links, access to archived pages,
access to Encyclopedia Britannica content, and an
instant messaging feature. In May of 2002 Alexa
released Alexa Web Search and Alexa Toolbar version
6.5. By partnering with Google, Alexa has built a new
kind of search engine, one that helps users
collaborate and find the best sites, with less effort.
Alexa's crawl donations to the Internet Archive have
now surpassed the 200 terabyte mark |
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AOL Search allows its members to search across the
web and AOL's own content from one place. The
"external" version, listed above, does not list
AOL content. The main listings for categories and
web sites come from the Open Directory (see
below). Google (see below) also provides
crawler-based results, as backup to the directory
information. |
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AltaVista is consistently one of the largest
search engines on the web, in terms of pages
indexed. Its comprehensive coverage and wide range
of power searching commands makes it a particular
favorite among researchers. It also offers a
number of features designed to appeal to basic
users, such as "Ask AltaVista" results, which come
from Yahoo (see below), and directory listings
from the Open Directory and Overture. AltaVista
opened in December 1995. It was owned by Digital,
then run by Compaq (which purchased Digital in
1998), then spun off into a separate company which
is now controlled by CMGI. Today is owned by Yahoo
- Inktomi - Overture. |
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Ask Jeeves is a human-powered search service that
aims to direct you to the exact page that answers
your question. If it fails to find a match within
its own database, then it will provide matching
web pages from various search engines. The service
went into beta in mid-April 1997 and opened fully
on June 1, 1997. Some results from Ask Jeeves also
appear within AltaVista. |
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Teoma is an important crawler-based search engine
because it powers some of the results that appear
at the popular Ask Jeeves web site. In fact, Ask
Jeeves owns Teoma. Unlike the other crawlers
covered so far, Teoma has no free Add URL page.
This doesn't mean that you can't get listed,
however. Teoma crawls the web, so if you have
links pointing at your web site, you may get
included naturally. |
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Excite is one of the more popular search services
on the web. It offers a fairly large index and
integrates non-web material such as company
information and sports scores into its results,
when appropriate. Excite was launched in late
1995. It grew quickly in prominence and consumed
two of its competitors, Magellan in July 1996, and
WebCrawler in November 1996. These continue to run
as separate services. Excite is now own by
Overture. |
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Formerly called All The Web, FAST Search aims to
index the entire web. It was the first search
engine to break the 200 million web page index
milestone and consistently has one of the largest
indexes of the web. The Norwegian company behind
FAST Search also powers some of the results that
appear at Lycos (see below). FAST Search launched
in May 1999 and is powered today by Overture. |
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Google is a search engine that makes heavy use of
link popularity as a primary way to rank web
sites. This can be especially helpful in finding
good sites in response to general searches such as
"cars" and "travel," because users across the web
have in essence voted for good sites by linking to
them. The system works so well that Google has
gained wide-spread praise for its high relevancy.
Google also has a huge index of the web and
provides some results to AOL and Netscape Search. |
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Overture / Goto Unlike the other major search
engines, GoTo sells its main listings. Companies
can pay money to be placed higher in the search
results, which GoTo feels improves relevancy.
Non-paid results come from Inktomi. GoTo launched
in 1997 and incorporated the former University of
Colorado-based World Wide Web Worm. In February
1998, it shifted to its current pay-for-placement
model and soon after replaced the WWW Worm with
Inktomi for its non-paid listings. GoTo is not
related to Go (Infoseek). Paid listing from GoTo
also appear on other major search engines,
including AltaVista, Lycos, HotBot, Direct Hit,
MSN, Yahoo, Excite and Web Crawler. Overture
launched the Yahoo Group beginning 2004. |
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HotBot is a favorite among researchers due to its
many power searching features. In most cases,
HotBot's first page of results comes from the
Direct Hit service, and then secondary results
come from the Inktomi search engine, which is also
used by other services. It gets its directory
information from the Open Directory project .
HotBot launched in May 1996 as Wired Digital's
entry into the search engine market. Lycos
purchased Wired Digital in October 1998 and
continues to run HotBot as a separate search
service.
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iWon Backed by US television network CBS, iWon has
a directory of web sites generated automatically
by Google, which also provides its more
traditional crawler-based results. iWon gives away
daily, weekly and monthly prizes in a marketing
model unique among the major services. It launched
in Fall 1999 |
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LookSmart is a human-compiled directory of web
sites. In addition to being a stand-alone service,
LookSmart provides directory results to MSN
Search, Excite and many other partners. Inktomi
provides LookSmart with search results when a
search fails to find a match from among
LookSmart's reviews. LookSmart launched
independently in October 1996, was backed by
Reader's Digest for about a year, and then company
executives bought back control of the service.
LookSmart changed now to new keyword pay for
placement system. |
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Lycos started out as a search engine, depending on
listings that came from spidering the web. In
April 1999, it shifted to a directory model
similar to Yahoo. Its main listings come from the
Open Directory project, and then secondary results
come from the Lycos Search engine. Some Overture
results are also used. In October 1998, Lycos
acquired the competing HotBot search service,
which continues to be run separately. |
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Microsoft's MSN Search service is a
LookSmart-powered directory of web sites, with
secondary results that come from Inktomi.
RealNames and Direct Hit data is also made
available. MSN Search also offers a unique way for
Internet Explorer 5 users to save past searches. |
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Netscape Search's results come primarily from the
Open Directory and Netscape's own "Smart Browsing"
database, which does an excellent job of listing
"official" web sites. Secondary results come from
Google. At the Netscape Netcenter portal site,
other search engines are also featured. |
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The Open Directory uses volunteer editors to
catalog the web. Formerly known as NewHoo, it was
launched in June 1998. It was acquired by Netscape
in November 1998, and the company pledged that
anyone would be able to use information from the
directory through an open license arrangement.
Netscape itself was the first licensee. Lycos and
AOL Search also make heavy use of Open Directory
data. |
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Yahoo is the web's most popular search service and
has a well-deserved reputation for helping people
find information easily. The secret to Yahoo's
success is human beings. It is the largest
human-compiled guide to the web, employing about
150 editors in an effort to categorize the web.
Yahoo has over 1 million sites listed. Yahoo also
supplements its results with those from Google
(beginning in July 2000, when Google takes over
from Inktomi). If a search fails to find a match
within Yahoo's own listings, then matches from
Inktomi are displayed. Inktomi matches also appear
after all Yahoo matches have first been shown.
Yahoo is the oldest major web site directory,
having launched in late 1994. |
