Most people get on the computer and immediately go to a search engine they are comfortable with, whether its Google, Yahoo or another option. People have their habits and rarely step out of bounds to try something different. There are some new search engines out there, ones you have heard of but have maybe never tried.
- Clusty – Clusty is a web engine that looks a little harder for those things that are hard to find. Clusty searches other search engines for you and while the regular Web is in most cases successful, deep webpages are hard to find. Clusty is kind of off the beaten path, but something you might want to use if you’re doing an in-depth research project or paper.
- Bing – Bing is relatively new, becoming independent from MSN in 2009. The thought behind Bing is it gives you researching suggestions while you are searching. If you’re having trouble finding something on the Internet, Bing is a great search engine to lead you along the way. Bing is a Microsoft product, and is nowhere near what Google is, but gaining steadily as people become more comfortable with its technology and visual interactions.
- Mahalo – A distinct advantage of Mahalo is that it’s a human-powered site. For those of you that don’t like listening to voice prompts on the telephone, Mahalo might be a search engine to consider. Editors at Mahalo search through your request and find results for you. While you may not get as many hits as you would on Yahoo or Google, the information you do get may pertain more specifically to the actual request.
When you find you’re having difficulty locating exactly what you want on the Internet, the above search engines might be great vehicles to get you where you’re going. Thinking outside the box might be just the research advantage you’re looking for.