uLinkx (http://www.ulinkx.com/) Video Search Engine is very fast and provides very accurate result. You can even LIVE search on Youtube, Myspace, metacafe, Grouper... We crawl videos from top video sharing web sites. You can do lot more than only video search (Organize videos in playlist, syndicate using gadget/widgets).

Give it a try!!

I'm surprised that you didn't include Kosmix, though! =) [Note: I am a former employee of Kosmix]

We are working to remedy this problem and we apologize for the inconvenience."
You should probably mention that in your post. I got all excited to try something shiny & bubbly, but the prospect of opening IE to do so really puts a downer on that excitement.
(Although, yeah, I do have the IE Tab extension for Firefox so it just takes one more button click to open it, but still)

#1 uLinkx - Thanks for the tip!

#2 Omgili is one of the Top 100; but as for Yahoo! Answers and their kind, I don't like the uneven quality of the answers when anyone can pitch in.

#3 Ah yes, Kosmix. Sadly, there are hundreds of vertical search engines alone, and Health is certainly a worthy sub-category (see Healthline, Symptom Search, Healia, et al)

#4 That message is now listed in the Post. Thanks!

#5 Ms. Fox uses Fox? That's a new one! :-) I have forwarded your comments to KoolTorch, although I imagine they are reading them right here.

#6 See #5

#7 Ah, listen up people! Bob makes an observation that I have overlooked a similar feature in Grokker. You should go to Grokker (www.grokker.com) and look at the Map view, which is what Bob is talking about, to see for yourself.

It is 10:OO PM EST right now, but I encourage you to keep checking back to this comment section. Thanks, Bob!

#8/9 Congoo is both; it searches for Premium News Content.

Its pretty interesting that Snap.com is not in the list of Alternative Search engines. If you take a look at our numbers on Alexa and other metrics systems we are ranked very high. Not only have we stormed the scene in recent months with our 'preview' blog widget, but we have previously developed and evangelized CPA (which now both Google and Amazon are getting their feet wet with in specialized programs). Any thoughts on this intentional or maybe unintentional omission of Snap.com?

Jason Fields
Product Evangelist, Emerging Technology
www.Snap.com

it searches MySpace, Bebo, LinkedIn, Live Spaces, Friendster

#10 Mike Moschini - could you please give me some examples here in the comments of Linux or Mac friendly search engines? You haven't been snubbed - I invite you to help the Cause!

#11 Visual Search Engines, and now "Talking" (for lack of a better term) Search Engines are certainly interesting. On the Top 100, that which is "new" (new engine or older engines with new features)is highly prized. Before each list is published, I check the ones that are so new that they're not available yet! (See Cydral, Digger, dipsie, Megaglobe, mobot, Powerset, Serph, and subjex.net) Please not that the CogHog demo on the list is as new as it gets!

It's also why there were 32 + 16 = 48 new search engines on The List in the past two Updates; almost 50% of the 100!

#12 I missed www.younanimous.com because I rely on readers like you dan! It's in the "binder" now - for next month.

#13 SNAP. First off, Alexa and "other metrics" are of no weight on this particular list - please see the beginning of the article again. Also discussed in the beginning of the article: inclusion and exclusion are very intentional! In general, "previews" (KoolTorch uses them - see graphics) are fine. Big_Esquire (comment #15) is not complimentary of Snap; I would like to throw it out to the readers:

*Folks, What Do You Think of Snap(www.snap.com)?

#14 Yes, I'm pretty sure that Quintura is a clustering search engine in my book. However, this is why I used the term "scattergories," There Is No Unanimous Consensus on what the categories are, much less which engine fits in which category. And which feature is primary? Is Slifter a Mobile Shopping engine, or a Vertical|Shopping engine that happens to also be Mobile (secondary category)?

#15 See above

#16 Yes, Wink is a nice engine.

#17 Yes, and fisssh! is very new (to me).

Please keeps those cards and letters (comments) coming!

"Please KEEP those cards and letters (comments) coming!

#18 Max, what about Sugarcode? (www.sugarcode.com)
In what way is it better than Google? Why do you think it
should be in the Top 100? Who would you delete? Thanks!

Some examples:

SugarCodes.com
YubNub
Sidekiq

Or others you might know ..?

This is not the Top 115 Alternative Search Engines. So:

#1 Sakit - uLinkx should replace which one of the 100?

#2 jp - Yahoo! Answers should take the place of....

#3 Mark - Kosmix should be listed; who should be delisted?

#10 Mike - who would your Search Engine of the Month be?

#11 kaz - Which Visual Search Engines are missing??

#12 don - If I put Younanimous on, who should I take off?

#13 Jason, Ah yes, Snap. Jason, please "boot" someone off!

#18 Max, already asked you about Sugarcodes. Your reply?

This is a "reality check:" If you don't have an *appropriate* alt search engine on this version of the Top 100 that you would replace, your search engine should really go into the "Bottom 500" database that I maintain.

Because of the "New Rule" I suggest to delete CrossEngine. Its kinda like SugarCodes but I like the commandline type of site

It only supports IE. I'm not switching my browser to use their search engine. The search results are virtually unusable. To me they are.

I have to mouse over ten results to see what they are instead of just quickly scanning the page and reading all 10 results in a matter of seconds?

It also doesn't actually let me see multiple results at once so I have no immediate reference when deciding if I want to click on -this- link or -that-.

Awful awful awful.

There is the no-cookie, no records Google proxy Scroogle Scraper from the anti-Google site Google Watch.

And they have a way to embed their search in your site. They use the Google engine but their results come up without ads: See here.

btw I just approved the comments that were waiting in the moderation queue. sorry for delay (I just woke up).

* The interface at www.KoolTorch.com is first generation. It was developed to showcase some of our patented visualization concepts, the inevitable future of search interfaces. The traditional long text listings are simply ineffective for reviewing large numbers of results, an inefficient use of screen real estate, insulting to your intelligence and not a feasible mobile solution. How many times have you even reached items 91-100? With the traditional text list, we really just see what’s on the first few pages – not the full picture of what your search produces. Using graphics and other features, KoolTorch gives you a bigger picture and hopefully a little credit for your intelligence.

* With KoolTorch, many results (we chose 50, 100 for this version) are provided on the very first screen along with immediate information (ranking number, time remaining till auction or something else) and a context for review and drill down navigation (the categories) after just one click to initiate the search. If you want to see the results in a textual listing, just hit the ‚ÄúTEXT‚Ä? button near the top of the screen. This provides all depicted results in a text list (along with the same category drill down capability as the GUI pages). And you can go back and forth between formats. So, when you reach a GUI screen where you want to see descriptions for all the depicted results at once, whether it‚Äôs the first GUI screen or a drill down screen, you can convert to TEXT with one click. This unique KoolTorch feature allows you to switch to a text listing from any category at any level in the category tree.

* As to the Firefox glitch, we have no excuse. We are working on it and hope to have it back soon. As a gesture of our regret, let’s meet at Denny’s tonight at 11 and we'll treat all you Firefoxers to a big bowl of ice cream so you can CHILL OUT! Or just give us (and Charles Knight) a little slack.

* As to Grokker, Bob (#7), its actually very different. Here are a few differences. On the first KoolTorch screen, each search result is shown and accessible. This is not the case with Grokker. The results that reside in the small orbs on the first screen of Grokker are not shown or accessible until you click on the orb; then they are shown in isolation and not in relation to all the other results on the first screen. So Grokker does not give you the same big picture as KoolTorch. Second, Grokker does not have the same ‚Äútrue‚Ä? drill-down capability of KoolTorch. With KoolTorch, you can drill down through every level in the category structure of the underlying database to further narrow your navigation. Grokker seems to go down only a few levels. Finally, though we respect Grokker, it seems a little too complex and confusing for the masses. KoolTorch‚Äôs focus is to make search user-friendly for everyone.

* Pamela Fox (#5), we appreciate your comments. We readily admit KoolTorch is in a rudimentary form at this early stage; it will have significant development over time. Pamela, we would be grateful to have the opportunity to talk with you personally; if you would, please e-mail us at info@kooltorch.com and we will be in touch.

* KoolTorch, LLC is an early stage company with a strong patent foothold in the field of search GUI’s seeking capital, acquisition or strategic relationship to help take the technology to the next level.

Regards,

Randy Smith, Co-founder
KoolTorch, LLC

Check it out: SERPH (http://www.serph.com/) Please come back and share your impressions with the rest of us! -Charles

Following the new rule, I would delete turboscout, which is a documented Crossengine copycat.

I also tried Serph, which I found really genuine and useful, it should be considered to be part of the list.

Keep up the superb job you are doing!

Rather than replacing any Video Search Engine with uLinkx, I would suggest to expand the "Video Search Engine" list. Currently, it has only 3 entries. May be take out some of the Meta Search or Cluster Search.

In my view, Video Search Engine section needs little more exposure.

Pratheep

http://www.skrenta.com/2007/03/how_to_beat_google_part_1.html

"Rich, Matt says, that was a fun post. I know I enjoy playing the thought experiment of "What's the best way to compete with Company X?". I'd be curious to hear your thoughts on how to beat other companies in the search...industry..."

Wow, my understanding is that it is Google's corporate policy not to discuss alternative search engines by name, but it seems as though they wouldn't mind if Rick did a little research for them on how to beat those "other companies."

Well, here's one way, Matt, check out this list of The Top 100 Alterative Search Engines each month and then "cherry pick" the ones you like and leave the rest to fail for lack of market share. Good plan!

It looks like most of your client-side logic -- including even the most trivial scripts -- is written in VBScript. That's why it won't work with Firefox, or any other non-Microsoft browser.

In todays environment there is no excuse for having a user interface such as the one that KoolTorch shows, it is possible to be so much more dynamic.

I cant look at it on my home mac so i wont be able to have a look at their code but the fact that they use VBScript rather than Javascript just shows that they dont care about cross browser support, from memory it didnt seem to be too complicated to code in javascript.

Now I know KoolTorch is more of a tech demo than a working product but I have a few suggestions:
1) Measure relevancy by how far away its circle is from the central column.
2) Arrange by relevancy achieving a spiral like effect.
3) Show a preview of the top 3 results within the selected category
4) allow the user to rotate the category updating the corresponding results as you move it. Clicking on any orb will automatically rotate to that bit.
5) cache the results within javascript, intelligently preload images so that you are always just ahead of what the users want.
6) Dont patent ideas such as that, I would think that an interface would be hard to defend in court, you should conentrate on beating people by offering a better service.

With exception to the rotating code all of this is achievable by even middling javascript developers. You dont even need to visually rotate the categories, as long as you have a graphical way of viewing a few results at a time and moving to the next result set. You could still maintain the mouse over previews.

Perhaps I have missed a part of the functionality because I only had a quick look at it at work.

Ryan, in my pre-publication discussions with KoolTorch, that was one of my sugestions also. Having the wheels rotate like a (very) old telephone dial. Some of the Top 100 SE move or light up, or talk, etc.; gnod (music-map, liveplasma), Quintura and KartOO, Foxy Voxy and AbbyMe. Oh yes, and Google doesn't (move or light up or talk - not counting the personalized home page thingy).

I also think you have a good point about being the target audience. ChaCha, for example, is often said to have slow and/or Google-like responses; but the highly skilled techies that say this forget that ChaCha's Guided search is for those who Need Help Searching, it's not for experts!

Likewise, when I give a presentation on "The List," people do the "Oooh!" and "Aaah!" vocalizations because a) they have never seen most (all?) of these SE before, or b) they don't know or care what's "under the hood;" they just like the shiny bubbles. ;-)

I'm not sure about Kooltorch, it looks dated and of course the firefox issue. But the results, well i think its too much hard work for the individual who is searching and can't quite understand why you would choose this as your number 1.

I have outlined my top 5 out of your list and stated reasons :

1. Findsounds - I think this is super cool, and very niche. I have never come across a search engine like that before and find it very easy to use and find sounds.

2. ChaCha - This is very clever, what I like is that people can earn money by becoming guides that has to be cool. I think this would be very useful for older people who use the net and new users, ChaCha is not going anywhere and that's one to watch for me.

3. fisssh! - I like this one, being british and seeing this is from Wales, im surprised and impressed. My favourite tool on this one is the podcast search. As a huge fan of podcasts this brings back some good stuff.

4. Clusty - Again this is another brilliant search engine and i also like the name. The reviews are cool and i like that you can search wikipedia too!

5. Hakia - This is a cool one which returns good results however the whole logo and interface is slightly boring and not new.

I'd like to see some of these really take off, so let's wait and see!

Cheers Charles - Great Blog You Have!

That's wrong.

It's really 1 winner and 99 other winners; isn't it?

Great Report BYW!
Always,
Phil

The best I have seen is www.searchkindly.org. This site is non-profit, and donates 100% of advertising revenue to a charity chosen by user-voting each month. At the moment, every visit generates 1/3 of a cent for the charity - but this should increase as the site grows. It is powered by google, so you get awesome results, but the ingenuity of searching for charity makes the site that much better.

Another good site, www.goodsearch.com, donates more (1 cent) per visit, but is powered by yahoo, so the results aren't as good. Also, it is for-profit so does not donate all revenue.

Goodtree.com would also be worth checking out, but its legitimacy has been questionned. Everyclick.com is in a similar vein but less pleasent to use.

I think this type of search engine is a fabulous idea, and would merit being included in your list. These sites (and the charities they support) certainly could use the publicity. Searchkindly.org gets my vote.

Interesting list. I believe that your visual search category lacks Picsearch. As one of the three major image search providers (besides Google and Yahoo) we might not be alternative when it comes to syndication. But as an end-user destination site Picsearch is alternative. Picsearch is market leaders when it comes to relevancy and family firendliness within in image search. Picsearch is also the only carbon free search engine so far.

Best Regards
Carl Sarnstrand
Communications Manager
Picsearch

Compete.com Search should be on your list.

Why should it be on your list?!

Compete Search combines Compete SnapShot with Yahoo's search technology, alerting searchers to site traffic profiles, promotional codes and trust scores for each search result displayed. Search results also include special Compete Picks, that are selected and highlighted based on the actual post-click online activity of the Compete community for each keyword across Google, Yahoo, MSN, Live, etc.

ex. http://data.compete.com/results?Keywords=apple.com

Best,
Jay

Andrew, I must insist that you contact goodtree.com. You shouldn't bring up a question of legitimacy and just drop it on us - is it a legitimate site or not? Please report back what you find out by emailing me at: Charles@CharlesKnightSEO.com

I have several Charity Search Engines, but you provided some additional ones. It is definitely a new Vertical | sub-category (or scattergory).

Picsearch and Compete.com are both definitely in "the binder" from whence will come the Top 100 update for April.

Language search engine (not only english) need to feature more prominently. Not only because I am part of one such effort, but also because language search engine have diffferent technical hurdles to overcome and they are the future with users on the rise.

www.raftaar.com is the first integrated Hindi language search engine. Unlike English, Hindi websites generally have english keywords, no standardisation of fonts, most sites are not in unicode and users have little knowledge of how to type in the 'devnagri' script using a roman script standard keyboard. Raftaar.com was the first to address these needs.

Peeyush Bajpai
co-founder www.raftaar.com

In my defense, I would like to point out that the List has had onkosh, an Arabic search engine, Yandex, a Russian search engine on this month's update, and in my "binder" I have Baidu, the largest search engine in China, and a Japanese alt, also.

The Top 100 has always been open to non-English engines.

I agree with Andrew. It would be nice to see a new category with all the search engines that benefit charities in your next update.

I recently joined the GoodTree.com team as an employee and we're definitely legit. One of the things we've been working on these past few months is providing full financial disclosure. Anyone can say they're giving money to charities but how do you show it? We decided to open our financial books to independent auditors whose final report is listed on our site.

http://www.goodtree.com/charities/financial_info

Andrew, Charles...let us know what you think. :)

So I'll conclude that goodtree is legitimate. There are still some other things about it I don't like.
This site gives a good comparison:
http://ngimagination.wordpress.com/2007/02/23/searchkindly-has-a-different-model-than-goodsearch-or-goodtree/

Too summarise the main reasons I like goodsearch better than goodtree: Goodtree's results come from infospace, and you can only choose from a small list of (big) charities (compared to goodsearch, which adds 100 charities a day).

I prefer searchkindly.org to both, though, because it has the best search results (generally what one uses a search engine for), it is not out to make a profit so donates 100% to charity, and seems more transparent. On the other hand, its actual donation is 1/3 that of goodsearch and goodtree (although this should rise as more people use, better advertising deals ect). It also can be slow to load.

So, Eddie, to sum up: I'm 99% convinced goodtree.com is legitimate. If it gave only google's results, instead of infospace results, and allowed me to select some smaller charities (who actually need the donations), I would use it. As it is, I'll stick with searchkindly.org.

Finally, have a look at
http://www.doshdosh.com/giving-to-charity/13-charity-search-engines-that-help-you-give-money-to-charity-for-free/
for some more charities. MagicTaxi caught my eye especially.

And when I say MagicTaxi, I mean jikolp.com.
My brain is not doing its thing today!

don't forget us ;-) - the NosyJoe.com - yet another social search engine :)... we are still working on it but we hope soon to be up and running in public beta :)

cheers

The Nosiest Joe

I hear you on the charity selection part. That was something we have given a lot of thought to. Give a little bit of money to many charities, or give a significant amount to a few charities? We talked to GoodTree members, with charities, foundations, with our advisors like Suzanne Siskel from the Ford Foundation and Carl J. Schramm from the Kauffman Foundation to try and decide that issue. Right now where we come out is that it will have more of an impact to focus on fewer charities and send them more per charity, like an organization like (RED) does. Going forward, the GoodTree community will, of course, nominate and elect new additions to the list of Supported charities (big and small). ( http://goodtree.com/charities/) Perhaps this approach will change down the road.

On the search engine front, that was a tough choice too. We all have our favorites. Perhaps one from Charles' list here or even the major ones like Yahoo, Google or MSN. We knew we needed solid search results for GoodTree but equally important was finding a solution that would generate significant money for charities. By using InfoSpace, GoodTree gets a search results feed that includes the top Google results along with Yahoo, MSN, Ask, and others. So far it seems to be working. The GoodTree community has generated over $20,000 for charities in '06 and we're still in beta. (see comment #55 for charity donation breakdown)

Hope that's helpful.
Eddie