ReadWriteWeb got a sneak peak at Wolfram’s Alpha search today. The verdict? Although it may not be a “Google killer” it’s possibly a strong alternative to Wikipedia for mathematical and engineering information according to ReadWriteWeb’s Frederic Lardinaois:
What looks particularly interesting are the results returned for math and other numeric or statistical pieces of information. For equations, there are nice graphs and answers worked out for you. For queries about numbers of various pieces of information, there are graphs and charts. It looks all well done and fits a current hole in search engines. As I’ve blogged before I’m not sure why search engine’s that are trying to differentiate themselves, such as Microsoft’s Live Search, haven’t tried to provide more complete answers to questions. I just don’t get it. I’m glad to see Wolfram stepping into this void.
Now I need to look into hooking up the Silverlight Math Input Panel to Alpha.
All of this takes me back to a post a made a couple years back, asking for Live Search to open their doors to partners in search–not by paying them–but by sharing revenues. If you ask me, Wolfram’s Alpha is one such partner ready to go. Live Search–or whatever it’s going to be called–should be about being that one place where you can find the answer. If you need a math problem solved, go to Live Search. If you need a paper translated, you go to Live Search. If you need to determine the best way to optimize the cuts in a piece of glass, you go to Live Search. Too specialized you argue? For Microsoft? Yes. But there are companies out there that can provide these kinds of answers online. Do they all need to manage their own servers supporting some huge number of users? No. That’s where they can partner with Microsoft’s infrastructure. Live Search shares the dollars back. Of course, spammers and the like will all sign up, so a set of wikipedia-like trusted editors/judges are in order. American Idol needs judges, so does a revenue sharing system. There’s nothing like humans to keep the quality up. A service that makes it out of the farm team give enough votes and users can graduate to Live Search and share in the big dollars. Point is there’s more to search than just search. Finding answers is useful too. Even if done infrequently. For those that live off of the answers or needs to use them as part of an automation process, there’s an app for that. That’s when you need to pull out the wallet and actually pay for something. Baseline, infrequently used services? No. Those should be free and those should be available on Google or Live Search or wherever.