Alternative Search Engines

Two search engines strive to cut the spam and improve results

In a video interview on WebProNews.com, Blekko CEO Rich Skrenta claims that 90 percent of the URLs on the Web are spam: sites loaded with advertising, misleading information and unreliable content. Blekko is one of two new search engines that try to distinguish themselves from the major players like Google and Yahoo by aggressively cutting spam from their results.

Blekko debuted in late 2010 and introduced slashtags to web searches. Slashtags are a refinement tool designed to narrow searches to specific categories. For example a search term followed by /date will list results in order beginning with the most recent. To limit results to health topics a user might use /health or /medicine. At last count, Blekko offered more than 100,000 slashtags and users can sign up to add more. The site includes a video to explain how to use the slashtags.

By themselves, slashtags won't necessarily filter spam. Blekko, like most search engines, uses search algorithms -- mathematically based programs -- that filter results. However, Blekko also offers a human filtering component. Blekko editors vet useful sites in specific categories and users can also register to identify the most relevant sites. So far, Blekko's efforts have earned mixed opinions. Early reviews at PCMag.com and Download Squad panned the search engine. Reviewers say it's slow and that the slashtags are cumbersome. Editors at AppAppeal.com agree that slashtags might confuse some users. In a comparative review, The Daily Beast finds that Blekko holds its own with Google and Bing in some searches, but overall Blekko's results are not more relevant than the other search engines.

Web searchers can test Blekko's results for themselves with the site's 3 Engine Monte feature. Users enter a search and get a page of blind results from Blekko, Google and Bing. Then, users can pick the results page they like best.

Like Blekko, DuckDuckGo -- voted the best search engine of 2011 by About.com readers -- seeks to filter unreliable sites from its search results. In fact the two search engines partnered to share technology in 2010. In the deal, DuckDuckGo got access to Blekko's pre-approved sites and Blekko received use of DuckDuckGo's zero-click information.

At first glance the DuckDuckGo start page looks starkly similar to Google, except for the duck logo centered above the search field. However, DuckDuckGo distinguishes itself with many features reviewers like, including disambiguation prompts -- questions that help clarify the user's search request. A DuckDuckGo search will also yield what's called zero-click information, a box that appears above the regular search results and includes factual information that attempts to answer the user's query. Reviewers also approve of the way DuckDuckGo filters advertising spam from its results. To help users spot reliable brands, website logos appear next to the sites' entry on the results page. Reviewers further enjoyed the variety of calculators and conversion tables on the site's Goodies page. Mathematicians, programmers and other serious computer users can access more complex tech tools.

A reviewer at Wired says that DuckDuckGo leads the Internet in privacy protection. Unlike most other sites, DuckDuckGo does not save, or share, a user's search history. Users are also protected from so-called search leakage. On other search engines, when you click on a search result your computer's IP address and search terms are sent to the website. DuckDuckGo doesn't allow this. Its privacy policy page offers further suggestions for protecting user privacy and search history.

We found numerous positive reviews for DuckDuckGo. About.com's Net For Beginners page lists it as one of the top 10 search engines (Note: ConsumerSearch is owned by About.com, but the two don't share an editorial affiliation).(Note: ConsumerSearch is owned by About.com, but the two don't share an editorial affiliation).(Note: ConsumerSearch is owned by About.com, but the two don't share an editorial affiliation). BusinessWorld features it prominently in a list of Google alternatives. SearchEngineLand.com, Time Techland.com and AppAppeal.com all recommend DuckDuckGo as a useful search engine.