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Humans ChaCha Into Search Dance 
By: SearchNewz Staff 2006-09-05 It's so crazy it just might work: a live person, like your own personal attach to guide you through the maze and answer questions you don't know how to ask a computer. That's the idea behind ChaCha, a search engine founded from pure geek credibility, and hooks searchers up with paid "guides" to help them find what they're looking for. If you pay extra attention, you may be familiar with the founder. But more likely you're familiar with what he's done for your everyday life. Or maybe you don't use voice mail or iTunes. Scott Jones has a plethora of titles, but he seems to prefer three: inventor, entrepreneur, pioneer. He has awards for being all three, and a patent list as long as your arm. Jones put ChaCha forth in private testing this week, with plans to open it up in beta testing later this year. ChaCha puts humans into the game of search, earning $5-$10 an hour (in some cases up to $20) to be subject matter experts. Recruited from colleges, retirees, and stay-at-home parents, the guides are available via instant message, and labelled apprentice, pro, master, or elite. Reputations and earnings are based on user and system ratings in addition to the chance to make 10 percent of what anyone they recruit makes. The need for the human touch in search, says Jones, arises from statistics revealing that nearly a third of searchers don't find answers to their questions, or wrestle with algorithms for an average of 11 minutes before finding the desired source. Guides have one minute to return search results, showing snippets of webpages that may have the answers to user questions. Successful answers are indexed by the system as well so repeats are quickly accessed. During slower periods, if ChaCha guides have time to lean, they have time to glean (bada-bing!). Guides search for popular search terms while idle. So far, Jones has about 2,500 guides in his ChaCha army, with plans to increase the staff to 3,000 by beta launch. Observers are noting that while this is potentially a fabulous idea, the difficulty will lie in execution. There are a lot of "moving parts" involved. Have a bookmark! - 
About the Author: One of the many staff writers covering the search engine industry for SearchNewz.com. |
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