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ChaCha counts on guides
ChaCha is a meta search engine that offers a unique twist--it has guides that can help you find information via live chat. It's a worthy stopover in the Life without Google experiment.
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The initial results
To test out the people aspect of the search, which is really the main selling point, I picked a topic that wasn't way difficult but not easy either. My mission: Find blog posts related to Andrew Morton, a Linux programmer at Google. Here's my search.
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Asking for help
After being asked whether I wanted some human help I decided to proceed.
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Chat session
These human results aren't instant, which can be a problem is you're impatient.
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Patience
The chat session tells me to keep my patience as Ryan a guide looks for the goods. He also asks questions to refine the search.
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Delivering results
Ryan turns up a result that wasn't perfect, but was something I wouldn't have found on my own. You can also rate the guide.
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Video results
A look at the video results on a search for Andrew Morton. Four results were relevant from what I can tell. Others less so. I found the video wall on the right way annoying.
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News results lacking
The news results were functional, but I found the presentation a bit lacking. It would be helpful if things were grouped together better. Here's a search on AMD's benchmarking issues
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Audio search
The audio search was also an interesting twist. You can also play the audio right from your browser. One gripe: Dates weren't given so the only way to know the podcast date is to click. You may get an old podcast as I did.
ChaCha counts on guides
ChaCha is a meta search engine that offers a unique twist--it has guides that can help you find information via live chat. It's a worthy stopover in the Life without Google experiment.Related Topics:
Software Enterprise Software Developer Open Source Software Mobility CloudBy Larry Dignan
Larry Dignan is Editor in Chief of ZDNet and Editorial Director of TechRepublic.
Full Bio
Larry Dignan is Editor in Chief of ZDNet and Editorial Director of TechRepublic.