What was the first search engine?

[poshgarden]

What was the first search engine?

[steve lobo]

Originally Posted by poshgarden

What was the first search engine?

The first search engine created was Archie in 1990

[SerenMckay]

The first few hundred web sites began in 1993 and most of them were at colleges, but long before most of them existed came Archie. The first search engine created was Archie, created in 1990 by Alan Emtage, a student at McGill University in Montreal.

[manige3e]

AltaVista, the Google of its day, is now to be gobbled up by Overture. It’s a famous name that’s seen better days. But AltaVista’s not the only major search player to have faded, as years have gone by. Come along and see the early search engines that have died, those that have been transformed, who’s survived and how the “new” players that are no longer so young are doing.

Of interest to history buffs will also be my The End For Search Engines? article, written at the beginning of 2001, when many assumed search engines were a dying breed (I argued differently). Also, see the Major Search Engines page for links to some of the services mentioned below and additional history.

Rest In Peace

Open Text (1995-1997): Yahoo’s original search partner was also a popular web search site of its own in 1995. The company crawled the web to gather listings, just as Google does today. Open Text decided to focus instead on enterprise search solutions, where it is currently successful. Web search operations closed in mid-1997.

Magellan (1995-2001): An early search engine that saw its popularity drop immediately after being purchased by Excite in mid-1996. It was closed in April 2001.

Infoseek (1995-2001): Launched in early 1995, Infoseek originally hoped to charge for searching. When that failed, the popular search engine shifted to depending like others on banner ads. Disney took a large stake in the company in 1998 and went down the “portal” path that other leading search engines had followed. The site was also renamed “Go.” Its failure to make money caused Disney to stop Go’s own internal search capabilities abruptly in early 2001. Today, Go remains operating, powered by Google.

Snap (1997-2001): Launched by CNET in 1997, Snap first used Infoseek, then Inktomi, then created its own directory of human-edited listings that were coupled with clickthrough technology that ranked results in part by what people clicked on. NBC later acquired a majority interest in the company, then renamed it NBCi and intended to win the “portal wars” with the site. But as with Disney and Infoseek, the site’s internal search technology was abruptly closed in early 2001. It is currently powered by meta search results from Infospace.

Direct Hit (1998-2002): When Google first appeared as the hot new search technology in 1998, so did Direct Hit, featuring the ability to measure what people clicked on in search results as a way to make those better. It gained a deal with HotBot and was offered as a search feature on other portals such as Lycos and MSN. It was purchased by Ask Jeeves in 2000, then neglected over the following years. The site was formally closed in early 2002.

Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes

Lycos (1994; reborn 1999): Lycos operated one of the web’s earliest crawler-based search engines. Lycos stopped depending on that spider in 1999 and instead now outsources for its search results from AllTheWeb.

WebCrawler (1994; reborn 2001): WebCrawler still exists as a meta search engine that gets results from other search engines, rather than through its own efforts. Now owned by Infospace, WebCrawler was arguably the web’s first crawler-based search engine in the way we know them today. It launched in early 1994 as a University of Washington research project, was purchased by AOL in 1995, then sold to Excite at the end of 1996. The WebCrawler spider was deactivated in December 2001.

Yahoo (1994; reborn 2002): Before Google, before AltaVista, there was Yahoo. Despite all the changes in the search space over the years, Yahoo has remained one of the most popular search destinations on the web. Yahoo stood out from its early competitors by using humans to catalog the web, a directory system. Crawler-based results from its partners only kicked in if there were no human-powered matches. That actually made Yahoo more relevant than competitors for many years, until the Google-era ushered in crawler-based results that were both comprehensive and highly relevant. Yahoo caught up with that era in October 2002, when it dropped its human-powered results in preference to Google’s results. The Yahoo Directory still exists and is leveraged by the company, but today’s Yahoo is a far different creature than what it was for all those years before.

Excite (1995; reborn 2001): Quickly gaining popularity after launching in late 1995, Excite crawled the web to gather listings. In 1996, the company bought two rivals, Magellan and WebCrawler, then itself was transformed via a merger into Excite@Home. Excite stopped gathering its own listings in December 2001, in the wake of its parent company’s bankruptcy. Now a new “Excite Networks” company owns the Excite web site, while Infospace has a license to provide meta search results to Excite in perpetuity.

HotBot (1996; reborn 2002): Launched in May 1996, HotBot was initially powered by Inktomi and backed by Wired. HotBot’s wild colors, great results and impressive features drew acclaim. Lycos (now Terra Lycos) bought the service as part of Wired Digital in 1998. As the “other” Lycos search engine, it suffered from a lack of attention by its parent. Last December, it was revitalized as a meta-like search engine, offering access to results from four different major search engines: Google, FAST, Teoma and Inktomi.

[manige3e]

AltaVista, the Google of its day, is now to be gobbled up by Overture. It’s a famous name that’s seen better days. But AltaVista’s not the only major search player to have faded, as years have gone by. Come along and see the early search engines that have died, those that have been transformed, who’s survived and how the “new” players that are no longer so young are doing.

Of interest to history buffs will also be my The End For Search Engines? article, written at the beginning of 2001, when many assumed search engines were a dying breed (I argued differently). Also, see the Major Search Engines page for links to some of the services mentioned below and additional history.

Rest In Peace

Open Text (1995-1997): Yahoo’s original search partner was also a popular web search site of its own in 1995. The company crawled the web to gather listings, just as Google does today. Open Text decided to focus instead on enterprise search solutions, where it is currently successful. Web search operations closed in mid-1997.

Magellan (1995-2001): An early search engine that saw its popularity drop immediately after being purchased by Excite in mid-1996. It was closed in April 2001.

Infoseek (1995-2001): Launched in early 1995, Infoseek originally hoped to charge for searching. When that failed, the popular search engine shifted to depending like others on banner ads. Disney took a large stake in the company in 1998 and went down the “portal” path that other leading search engines had followed. The site was also renamed “Go.” Its failure to make money caused Disney to stop Go’s own internal search capabilities abruptly in early 2001. Today, Go remains operating, powered by Google.

Snap (1997-2001): Launched by CNET in 1997, Snap first used Infoseek, then Inktomi, then created its own directory of human-edited listings that were coupled with clickthrough technology that ranked results in part by what people clicked on. NBC later acquired a majority interest in the company, then renamed it NBCi and intended to win the “portal wars” with the site. But as with Disney and Infoseek, the site’s internal search technology was abruptly closed in early 2001. It is currently powered by meta search results from Infospace.

Direct Hit (1998-2002): When Google first appeared as the hot new search technology in 1998, so did Direct Hit, featuring the ability to measure what people clicked on in search results as a way to make those better. It gained a deal with HotBot and was offered as a search feature on other portals such as Lycos and MSN. It was purchased by Ask Jeeves in 2000, then neglected over the following years. The site was formally closed in early 2002.

Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes

Lycos (1994; reborn 1999): Lycos operated one of the web’s earliest crawler-based search engines. Lycos stopped depending on that spider in 1999 and instead now outsources for its search results from AllTheWeb.

WebCrawler (1994; reborn 2001): WebCrawler still exists as a meta search engine that gets results from other search engines, rather than through its own efforts. Now owned by Infospace, WebCrawler was arguably the web’s first crawler-based search engine in the way we know them today. It launched in early 1994 as a University of Washington research project, was purchased by AOL in 1995, then sold to Excite at the end of 1996. The WebCrawler spider was deactivated in December 2001.

Yahoo (1994; reborn 2002): Before Google, before AltaVista, there was Yahoo. Despite all the changes in the search space over the years, Yahoo has remained one of the most popular search destinations on the web. Yahoo stood out from its early competitors by using humans to catalog the web, a directory system. Crawler-based results from its partners only kicked in if there were no human-powered matches. That actually made Yahoo more relevant than competitors for many years, until the Google-era ushered in crawler-based results that were both comprehensive and highly relevant. Yahoo caught up with that era in October 2002, when it dropped its human-powered results in preference to Google’s results. The Yahoo Directory still exists and is leveraged by the company, but today’s Yahoo is a far different creature than what it was for all those years before.

Excite (1995; reborn 2001): Quickly gaining popularity after launching in late 1995, Excite crawled the web to gather listings. In 1996, the company bought two rivals, Magellan and WebCrawler, then itself was transformed via a merger into Excite@Home. Excite stopped gathering its own listings in December 2001, in the wake of its parent company’s bankruptcy. Now a new “Excite Networks” company owns the Excite web site, while Infospace has a license to provide meta search results to Excite in perpetuity.

HotBot (1996; reborn 2002): Launched in May 1996, HotBot was initially powered by Inktomi and backed by Wired. HotBot’s wild colors, great results and impressive features drew acclaim. Lycos (now Terra Lycos) bought the service as part of Wired Digital in 1998. As the “other” Lycos search engine, it suffered from a lack of attention by its parent. Last December, it was revitalized as a meta-like search engine, offering access to results from four different major search engines: Google, FAST, Teoma and Inktomi.

[nathanleo]

Come along and see the early search engines that have died, those that have been transformed, who’s survived and how the “new” players that are no longer so young are doing.