A9, Is it How Search Engine Is Done?

April 26, 2004

A couple of weeks ago a new search engine went online. There wasn’t much fanfare and reaction was equally muted. It was a9.com and it’s amazon.com’s latest move to muscle in on the search engine industry.

A9.com is merely a shell around google’s index. What’s added is a number of extra features designed to dazzle the users. There are a number of nifty features. For example if you are searching for Arkansas, you can simply type a9.com/arkansas. Another valuable feature is that book contents are also searched for the matching terms and the results are displayed in a separate window.

I’m not sure if this will be a successful venture for amazon.com. I used a9.com for a bit but once the novelty wore off, I switched back to google. Search engine history has shown that less is more. Google’s simple site but powerful search capabilities made it the powerhouse it is today. Cutting-edge sometimes cuts both ways.