Revolutionize Search

Currently, advertisers bid to have their ads shown on search results pages depending upon specific keywords that users type into search engines. But Powerset believes that its natural language processing could change the way ads are displayed and enhance the profitability for all parties involved.

"If people aren't bidding on keywords, and are bidding on concepts, it could completely change the ball game," said Scott Prevost, Powerset's General Manager and Product Director.

However, not everyone is a fan of this new natural language search process. This includes Don Reisinger from Mashable. Here is why Don believes natural language search will not work.

"Keywords may not be fool-proof and may tend to make things more difficult for advertisers, but we can't forget that bidding on them works for one reason: it simplifies a process that is extremely hard to gauge.

In Powerset's scheme, companies need to rely upon the intention of those same people and how well it can guess how they interact with a search engine, regardless of the keywords used.

Trying to guess what people will say, as opposed to what people will include in their query, is extremely difficult. Why try to guess a whole sentence or a structured query when you can pick one word and hope people use it?"

What are your thoughts on this, do you think there is a future in search for natural language processing?

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