Some Contratimes readers will recall that I have voiced more than a little concern over the rather invasive practices of Google (sorry Google).
This morning I read about Cuil (pronounced cool, I believe), a new search engine created by former Google engineers. Cuil's claim that the engine searches more sites than any other, even Google, is well beyond my ability to verify. But Cuil's promise that all searches are essentially anonymous seems rather proper. No collecting data, no stashing searches, no loading up a browser with cookies.
I have already spent some time using Cuil (I like its "safe search" filter especially), and I must say it is at least an attractive alternative to the rather uninspired look of Google, Yahoo or Ask. I am not sure about its critical effectiveness, but perhaps my doubts are due to my near total dependence on Google: It is hard to get used to new things. But I think I will give it a go for a bit; it's already the default search engine in two computers in this household.
I'd love to know what you think.
Peace.
BG
2 comments:
While I'm not sure Cuil is it, we won't be hurt one bit if Google gets some competition. After all, it's easy to "Do No Evil" when one controls all the search results for that very term.
Dear Nate,
Competition can only be good. But I am uncertain Cuil can pull it off. I have no idea what sort of algorithm Cuil is using, but I am not sure it is an effective one. It seems Cuil can only handle a search string of just a few terms in length; yesterday my searches were turned down repeatedly for being too arcane. However, a Google search using the same terms gave me the sort of results I needed and expected.
But who knows. I did note that when I was able to truly reduce my search query to the simplest and strictest terms, I found what I was looking for.
Peace,
BG
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