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Joined: Mon Feb 25, 2008 21:51:46 pm
Posts: 10225
Location: Norfolk, England
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Before GoogleI was ploughing through some very old files on my computer yesterday. I have an ancient folder marked 'internet aids' from way back when I was building my first website, and needed all the help I could get! This seems to be a perfect opportunity to show some of it's contents on Search Engines. Sadly I can't be sure of the date, I reckon it's from around 1998/99. How many of these do YOU remember? Quote: The Major Players
Below are the current major players in the search engine game. Yahoo and some others, though not true search engines, are listed below because so many people use them. Some additional search services are also listed on the Other Search Services page.
AltaVista http://altavista.digital.com/
Opened in Dec. 1995, AltaVista is run by Compaq and has gained wide-spread name recognition. It partnered with Yahoo in June 1996, providing secondary results until June 1998. It is consistently the largest search engine on the web, in terms of pages indexed, and is a particular favorite among researchers. It has a partnership with LookSmart that provides it with directory listings.
AOL NetFind http://www.aol.com/netfind/
Launched in March 1997, AOL NetFind is a branded-version of the Excite search engine in the US and Canada. It has a different name and a different look, but it is basically Excite underneath. In Europe, Lycos provides the results in the same manner as Excite.
Excite http://www.excite.com/
Launched in late 1995, Excite grew quickly in prominence and consumed two of its competitors. In July 1996, Excite purchased Magellan. In November 1996, it acquired WebCrawler. These continue to run as separate services.
HotBot http://www.hotbot.com/
Launched in May 1996, HotBot is Wired Digital's entry into the search engine market. The site is powered by the Inktomi search engine, which is also used by other services. It has a partnership with LookSmart for its directory listings.
Inktomi http://www.inktomi.com/
Originally, there was an Inktomi search engine at UC Berkeley. The creators then formed their own company with the same name and created a new Inktomi index, which was first used to power HotBot. There is no way to query the Inktomi index directly, as it is only made available through Inktomi's partners with whatever filters and ranking tweaks they may apply.
Infoseek http://www.infoseek.com/
Around since early 1995, Infoseek is well-known, well-reviewed and well-connected. The old "Infoseek Guide" index only had about 1 to 2 million URLs cataloged. In Fall 1996, the new service with 30 million URLs was introduced.
LookSmart http://www.looksmart.com/
LookSmart launched in Oct. 1996. It is the closest rival Yahoo has, in terms of a human-compiled directory. It listed about 300,000 web sites as of Feb. 1998. LookSmart is positioned on the Netscape Net Search page and also provides browsable listings for both AltaVista and HotBot. LookSmart started independently, was backed by Reader's Digest for about a year, and then company executives bought back control in the service.
Lycos http://www.lycos.com/
Around since May 1994, Lycos is one of the oldest of the major search engines. It began as a project at Carnegie Mellon University. The name Lycos comes from the Latin for "wolf spider." Lycos lists sites in two main ways. There are search engine listings, and there is an associated directory called "Community Guides." Sites are automatically listed in these using technology from WiseWire, a company Lycos acquired in early 1998.
Microsoft http://home.microsoft.com/
Microsoft announced in Oct. 1997 that it was partnering with Inktomi to create a search engine for its Internet Start page. Currently, that search service has yet to appear. At the moment, Internet Start features web searching via other companies. Chances are, these other services will continue to be featured even after Microsoft's Inktomi-powered service begins.
Netscape http://www.netscape.com/
Netscape shifted its strategy in Spring 1998 to compete as a portal site. It's old site has been replaced with search and navigation offerings. Most of this content is repackaged by Netscape's partner, Excite.
Northern Light http://www.northernlight.com/ or http://www.nlsearch.com/
Northern Light opened to general use on Aug. 12, 1997. While it doesn't have the strategic alliances of the other major search engines, it is seriously crawling significant portions of the web and thus qualifies to be among the major search engines. Northern Light features an ability to classify documents by topic, which it hopes will distinguish it from some of the other search services, even those with their own topical listings.
Search.com http://www.search.com/
Launched March 1996, Cnet's Search.com underwent a major change in May 1997. It became a branded-version of the Infoseek search engine, as opposed to an interface to several different search engines, as it had been in the past.
Snap http://www.snap.com/
Another entry from Cnet, Snap is a directory of web sites supplemented by search results from Inktomi. It is rapidly eclipsing the Cnet Search.com service. It launched in late 1997.
WebCrawler http://www.webcrawler.com/
WebCrawler opened to the public on April 20, 1994. It was started as a research project at the University of Washington. America Online purchased it in March 1995 and was the online service's preferred search engine until Nov. 1996. That was when Excite, a WebCrawler competitor, acquired the service. Excite runs WebCrawler as an independent search engine. WebCrawler has an associated directory of reviewed sites, WebCrawler Select.
Yahoo http://www.yahoo.com/
Around since late 1994, Yahoo is the oldest major web site directory. Yahoo is well-known, well-used and well-respected. It is also the largest directory (as opposed to search engine), listing 750,000 web sites, as of Dec. 1997. Because Yahoo is a directory based on user submissions, it may not have some sites in its catalog that a crawler might find from searching the web each day. If a search of Yahoo's catalog doesn't turn up any useful links, users may then wish to consult with a search engine. Yahoo makes this easy to do. With a click, the query originally sent to the Yahoo catalog is "piped" or forwarded to any of the major search engines listed at the bottom of each results page. Because so many people use Yahoo, search engines listed first on Yahoo pages have a strategic advantage over others. Full rankings of these engines can be found on the Strategic Alliances page. Yahoo also supplements its results with those from Inktomi. If a search fails to find a match within Yahoo's own listing, then matches from Inktomi are displayed. Inktomi matches also appear after all Yahoo matches have first been shown.
_________________ Ian Billings - Norvic Philatelics GB stamps info: http://www.norphil.co.uk - also /catalog for our ecommerce site, blog.norphil.co.uk, shop.norphil.co.uk and Ian_norvic on twitter
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