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Ask.Com's New Look Competes Well With Google

Carl Bialik from WSJ writes "Ask Jeeves has been overhauled and renamed Ask.com. The Wall Street Journal's Walt Mossberg tested the new site against Google and found that Ask.com holds its own and even beats the search champ in some cases. 'It has some very nice features Google lacks, including previews of the sites it finds, an easy way to narrow or broaden your search results, and frequent top-of-the-screen answers that lead you directly to core information,' Mossberg writes."

13 of 214 comments (clear)

  1. Website time-lapse by brejc8 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I made some nice animations of the way the some sites have changed their layout (google, ask and altavista). Both altavista and ask are turning more and more google like.

    1. Re:Website time-lapse by brejc8 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I looked at altavista for the first time in years and noticed it being very google like and so I thought it would be nice to see how and why it changed. The script was pretty simple to make but took a while to run (overnight for each one). I like doing stuff like this as it improves my skills in different languages (in this case it was perl) and I thought learning a lot of languages might be an idea before writing my own.

  2. They need to do a lot better than Google... by g253 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    When people started using Google instead of Altavista or Yahoo, it was IMHO because Google was better than Yahoo and Altavista was selling out and turning into sheer crap. If Ask wants to grab some market share, it will not do to be as good as Google or to offer a couple of extra nice features, even if that's an impressive feat; they will have to be so much better that people will not want to use Google anymore. Good luck to them...

  3. Poor Jeeves... by PoitNarf · · Score: 5, Funny

    Last I heard was that Jeeves was so upset about being dropped that he clocked an ask.com board member on the head with a pipe in the ballroom.

    --

    "0101100101? It's just jibberish. *looks in mirror, gasps* 1010011010@!? AHHHHHH!!"
    1. Re:Poor Jeeves... by PoitNarf · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I found the ask.com cover story for Jeeves disappearance. I'm not buying it!

      http://sp.ask.com/en/docs/about/jeeveshasretired.h tml

      http://blog.ask.com/2006/02/thanks_jeeves.html

      --

      "0101100101? It's just jibberish. *looks in mirror, gasps* 1010011010@!? AHHHHHH!!"
  4. One big difference by Araxen · · Score: 4, Informative

    Ask.com throws big ad searches first before any of the results you actually want. Google ads are off to the side. I'll stick with Google still.

  5. Ask.com Maps and Directions by Lord+Satri · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I took a look at TFA. Is it me or they don't discuss this new important feature: Ask.com Maps & Directions.

  6. Re:not about "quality" per se by Guilly · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Funny, I'd like to see you say the following in future linux/microsoft bashing articles...

    Though a competitor may try to make advances against Microsoft Corporation with revampments, Microsoft's already got the golden brand and in this industry the guy who's at the top stays there as people feel more comfortable using what everyone else uses ... what's established. They're not going anywhere, move along.

    Thank you.

  7. excellent engine, took me right by wardk · · Score: 3, Insightful

    to google when I entered google in the search area.

    now if MS can pull of something like this....

  8. Preview not on all links by 192939495969798999 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The preview feature is useless because 1) it's not on every page that comes back and 2) it's not updated live. What is the point, really? Here's what i'd see in 2 seconds? I'll just spend the 2 seconds, who cares! It's much nicer to have, oh i dunno, a longer summary like Google has.

    --
    stuff |
  9. Re:For the lazy by npietraniec · · Score: 3, Informative

    I just did a search for my name and it returned documents on my website that have been gone for years... Their cache on my last name is HORRIBLY out of date... Just one search though, maybe they can compete better on more common terms.

  10. Re:For the lazy by hackstraw · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Unfortunately, I use Google because I like the results it provides.

    What else is there?

    With google I can do:

    my doctor's last name my_city, state

    Hit return, and at the top of the page there is the phone number to call. If only the number was hooked into an autodialer, when that comes, it will be cool.

    Google has usenet searches.

    Google has news searches (I get confused sometimes between news.google.com and groups.google.com, but...)

    Google has search by domain searches. Very useful to do .edu or .org or whatever to eliminate the .com domains who are trying to sell me crap.

    Google is instantaneous. ask.com is slow right now.

    Google has image searches.

    Google has video searches.

    Google will have music searches.

    Google...

    Yes, I'm a happy user. Thanks for Google having the best real estate on the web, and those greedy link parking whores that pay for my searching capabilities. Not to mention that its refreshing that I can buy ANYTHING that I search for at eBay while I'm at it. Very convenient.

  11. Google has one big advantage... by NthDegree256 · · Score: 4, Funny

    Yeah, yeah, but Google is a verb now. Try and compete with that, Ask.com.

    ... what?