What your favorite Meta-Search engine.

what is your favorite meta-search engine.

[nate_king1]

What is your favorite meta-search engine.

MetaCrawler.com
WebCrawler.com
Kartoo.com
ixquick.com
ez2www.com
vivisimo.com

Please let me know thanks.

[robjones]

I like vivissimo for the clustering feature and ixquick, although I don't like the way the results open in a new window with ixquick.

[chiyo]

ez2find.. I think thats the 5th one on your list. best meta engine by far i think. Fastest and uses only the most influential engine rankings for their meta listing. Very little dependence on PPC - only to the extent that the non-google search engines use them.

ixquick and kartoo are good too once you get your region right

(if you use ixquick in the UK mode it had many ppc listings last time i looked, but switching to international was better but still has PPC infections.)

kartoo is great (if you discount the ppc listings by fiddling around with selecting only centain search engines), for finding related sites and seeing "maps" of relevance relationships.

[Fischerlaender]

I rarely use meta search engines, because Google and FAST have an index which is large enough and their ranking algorithm is better than those of most metas; and of course Google is faster.

Sometimes I use metager.de. It is regarded as the best meta in Germany, but its interface is horrible.

Vivisimo has now a german interface and the clustering feature is really nice; however it is too slow.

[nate_king1]

Thanks for your replies. I think that their should be a forum dedicated for Meta-Search Engines. What do you think?

[Alternative Future]

Should DogPile not be mentioned here? Correct me if i am wrong and DogPile is not a metasearch!

KR,

-gs

[nate_king1]

DogPile is a meta engine however I don't like it at all. They just grab bidded listings for the results.

[Alternative Future]

Hi nate_king1,

When carrying out searches using DogPile I get results back from Google, Ask, Inktomi and FAST along with the bided listings from Overture, Looksmart, About...

-gs

[nate_king1]

Yea, but the first 35 listings are sponsored.

When carrying out searches using DogPile I get results back from Google, Ask, Inktomi and FAST along with the bided listings from Overture, Looksmart, About...

-Google is a sponsored search on dogpile
-ask is a sponsored search
inktomi and fast are paid for inclusion search.

[papamaku]

i used to think zapmeta.com was the best, but i just tried that ez2find you mentioned and think its cool.

[jrobbio]

I think Ixquick is very good although I do think it favours Gigablast too much in the equation. I think it is normally my third search point after google and Teoma.

[jeremy goodrich]

Meta engines these days are mostly mixes of paid results. Other than a clustering feature like Vivisimo, or the interface of KarTOO, what real value does a meta engine bring?

There isn't really anything there to 'optimize' for, yes? And the mix of algos, if there is one, only means that to be included you need to rank well in the other databases that are leveraged.

We don't need a forum for meta engines, because it's far too easy to put one together.

In about 2 days if I wanted, I could have a dozen "meta engines" lined up and ready to go. Does that mean we should discuss them all?

Nah, just doesn't work. This forum works, when there is a need to discuss one of the big ones like DogPile, IxQuick or what not.

There is a pretty distinct limit on the technology of any meta engine, and a limit on the value add that I've seen on every one of them.

What makes a meta engine worth talking about is it's unique features if you are a search engine junkie (like me and most people here...) / and or market share if you are interesting in selling.