The Future of Search Is Still Up for Grabs

Remember when Yahoo! was the runaway search engine leader in the nineties? Google flew under the radar until 1998, quietly building the Yahoo! killer in a cone of silence. Who is to say that the new kid on the block isn’t operating in stealth mode with a better search engine??

In a radical departure from the advertising-driven search that has dominated the web since the advent of search in the 1990s, a new generation promises smarter, more accurate, intelligent search.?

They are busily unraveling the intricacies of a disambiguous search and laser-focused on understanding context, intent, nuances of language, culture, dialects, and even slang.?

When Artificial Intelligence Meets Natural Language,?

Natural Language search is just the beginning. Context is the holy grail of outmaneuvering a global giant like Google. Its strength is also its Achilles heel, as its core business isn’t search. It’s advertising.??

Emerging new innovators are quietly stepping into the intersection of natural language search. This is where the future of voice search, digital assistants, and smart homes are integrated into a single omnichannel solution.?

Money Can’t Buy You Love

Of course. Google has the war chest to buy its way in and launch an acquisition spree. But with the Department of Justice breathing down its neck, this is not exactly the optimum time to pounce.?

Enter companies like Algolia and Lucidworks. They provide open-source platforms for developers to build search technology and provide personalized searches across every device anywhere in the world at any time.?

Their emphasis is on serving up results for queries in context. Google may not know if you're talking about the bat that hangs upside down in the cave or a baseball bat. It will optimize the results around advertising.?

Real Intelligence is Better Than Artificial Kind

The next generation of search engines know the difference between “storage,” whether it's technology hardware storage,? a suitcase, or a self-storage unit for your furniture.?

They are early movers in word-sense disambiguation, where “ambiguous” words with multiple meanings for many different people are reflected on the search engine results page.?

Michael Bloomberg used to say he wasn’t worried about his larger rivals. He was more concerned about the kid in the garage building a better mousetrap.?

Brilliant minds are building search engines based on a monthly membership model in stark contrast to the incumbent’s advertising-driven focus. This is going to get interesting.?

Andrew Ellenberg is the President & Managing Partner Of Rise Integrated, an innovative studio that creates, produces, and distributes original multimedia content across digital touchpoints. If you want to submit story ideas or ask about custom multimedia publishing, please call 816-506-1257. Read more of his work in Forbes.