Have you noticed the search results in Google degrading? I find more and more garbage web sites in the results. Sure the top results are usually pretty decent, but some are way off the mark. The problem is, no matter how often the smart people at Google tweak their PR algorhythm, there is an entire army of SEO experts looking to game the system as they try to get on the first page of results. And many of the web sites playing the SEO game are unfortunately pretty lame.
Enter Mahalo. The Hawaiian word for “thank you,” Mahalo bills itself as a human-powered search engine. The value proposition? The search results have all been screened by human editors, ensuring you get just the really good web sites.
In their own words:
Mahalo is the world’s first human-powered search engine powered by an enthusiastic and energetic group of Guides. Our Guides spend their days searching, filtering out spam, and hand-crafting the best search results possible. If they haven’t yet built a search result, you can request that search result. You can also suggest links for any of our search results.
Mahalo has only just launched their alpha today. According to CEO Jason Calacanis, they served 100,000 pages in the first hour of operation.
The idea is appealing, for sure. I took it for a quick spin, of course, testing to see if any of my web sites turned up. First I tried searching for instant messaging, only to be told ‘Oops! We haven’t hand-written a result page for “instant messaging” yet.’ Instead, I’m presented with the option to be notified when they do create their own results page, and a list of (what else?) Google’s search results. Back to square one.
Okay, next I tried “windows live messenger” with the same lack of of hand-crafted results. Hmmm…
They claim they are starting by going after the top terms. Obviously(?) I’m not hitting the top terms yet.
I try searching for the popular VoIP app Skype, and finally hit paydirt!
The results were decent. Without heavy analysis, they seemed to be a streamlined version of what you’d find on the first page of Google’s own search results for skype, plus a few recent Skype news stories (courtesy of Google News).
Each of their hand-written pages also includes a message board, allowing you to discuss what is or isn’t on the page. And you can see who at Mahalo wrote the page. The Skype page, for instance, was written by Dave from Los Angeles. He’s written a bunch of other Mahalo results pages, too. Sadly, Dave hasn’t included a link to BigBlueBall. Fortunately, I can recommend a link, too.
I checked the Skype results message board, but was promptly told that I had to login to participate on the message board. Ok, that means creating an account. So now, I’m User ID 342, a.k.a. Jeff.
What do you think of Mahalo, both in concept and execution? Could Mahalo, or something like it, supplant Google someday? And “Mahalo” for your comments!
UPDATE: BigBlueBall is on Mahalo! The BigBlueBall AIM Center made The Mahalo Top 7 for AOL Instant Messenger.
