Regardless of figures and statistics, the fact remains that, Google Inc, the Internet search behemoth is in fact the undisputed ruler of web search. However, as times change, so do the importance of the prevailing kings. Nowadays, numerous start up companies are working hard and patiently to succeed in bringing the next generation of search engines that, would in theory are expected to replace Google one day.
One such start up is, Quora, a company started by two ex-Facebook engineers is heading towards creating a new way of searching the web, by gather information in the form questions and answers in regards to a host of topics. With the help of Quora, users can post their questions and provide answers to the active questions, thereby creating comprehensive database of information, that is different than the conventional search engine functions. However, users would have to create an account with Quora, by connecting their Facebook or Twitter accounts with the service. As of now, Quora is comprised of nine employees and in the month of March this year, the company managed to raise $14 million in investment capital, led by Benchmark Capital.
This new trend of online search has been in experimentation process by numerous companies such as Yahoo! Inc. and LinkedIn Corp. and points to the emerging trend of providing relevant search results, based on user generated information, rather relying solely on algorithms. However, this new way of search is still a bit confusing as many a times, a user could be searching for just a particular query and in that terms, Google’s search box is still the most effective when it comes to online search.
