subtle overtures
July 14, 2003
You know, back when AltaVista was a big deal for DEC, I figured it was going to kill Yahoo, since Yahoo only had a directory and AV had full-text indexes of huge numbers of pages. Sure, AV hasn't kept its former glory, but it's still a damned good search engine and now Yahoo owns it, along with FAST. Say what you will about how giant, all-encompassing portals are a bad move, but Yahoo's the one who's still big enough to pull off a purchase of Overture, which is still ranked above Google's estimated value on the public markets. Amazing what half a decade's change can do.
And AltaVista? Used to be part of Digital, which was sold to Compaq, which merged with HP. And the Yahoo homepage has a nice little "Powered by HP" link. So it all comes full circle.
9:11 PM
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- Earlier: the future!
- Next: Upon the demise of Netscape
AltaVista-> DEC -> Compaq -> HP -> Yahoo! You're starting to sound like James Burke!
Yep, AltaVista was certainly a god-send. Then came along HotBot... now that I look back on it, it was remarkably similar to Google in some ways. Unfortunately, it had the misfortune of having "hot" in it's title, making it likely to be blocked by filter software.
Anyone still know if Google powers Yahoo's searches?
I'll lose whatever incredibly lame amount of geek cred I ever had for saying this, but I like searching on Yahoo because I can get both category searches and straight search-engine searches at once. I think Yahoo looks better than Google too.
*ducks*
Google does power Yahoo's searches. Though it's not 'pure'. Yahoo can and does blend many different elements on their results pages.
As far as liking Yahoo for their category results. Try searching for 'blogs' on Google. The first two links at the top of the page are category listings.
It's ok if you like Yahoo better for their looks. I think Anna Kournikova is the best tennis player in the world. Perhaps we are both deluded. ;)
Don't both Google and Yahoo provide web search first with a link to directory search?
I'm surprised Microsoft decided to go it alone rather than snap up Overture.
I'm also surprised that Overture didn't think of taking into account ad performance when determining listing position.
I'd also be surprised if Google closed at under $1.6B if it IPOed tomorrow.
I think Yahoo looks better than Google too.
Sam, do you mean the regular Yahoo homepage or the new search.yahoo.com?
You forgot the more recent history of Alta Vista in your chronology. HP sold it to CMGi few years back, who only recently sold it to Overture.
I think that Google is in a way better position than Yahoo/Overture in a long term. Their product is simply superior and this will pay out in the end.