[Search-l] _Techcrunch_: Jason Calacanis Launches Mahalo Today: Human Powered Search

[Jason Calacanis]

as I mentioned in my comments with the press we hope Wikia's open
source search works so we can leverage it for when our humans don't
have a result.

mahalo for checking it out!

best j

On 5/30/07, Seth Finkelstein <sethf at sethf.com> wrote:
> [Heavy disclaimer - I got a brief email from Jason Calacanis pointing me
> to this article, but I have no connection to him or his ventures
> (all stock options gratefully accepted, but I'm too independent-minded
> to make a good promoter/flack :-))]
>
> http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/05/30/jason-calacanis-launches-mahalo-today-human-powered-search/
>
> Jason Calacanis Launches Mahalo Today: Human Powered Search
> Michael Arrington
>
> Jason Calacanis, formerly of Weblogs, Inc. and more recently an
> Entrepreneur in Action at Sequoia Capital, will launch his newest
> startup, Mahalo, this afternoon at 3 PM PST. The site is password
> protected until then.
>
> Mahalo is a search engine, and will join Powerset as the more
> interesting new engines to launch in 2007.
>
> The service has features that are similar to the new Netscape news
> finder product that Calacanis launched last year at AOL: expert guides
> will determine the most relevant results. The main search results are
> provided by guides (Mahalo employees), who find relevant results for
> search terms. User submitted results are also included.
>
> The primary results for search terms are included at the top, in a
> "top seven" area. These are hand picked results from the guids that
> should all be good results for the query (see screen shot below of
> results for "Paris Hotels" - click for larger view). To the right of
> the results are "Guide Notes" which include additional information
> including relevant additional searches and "Fast Facts." In the case
> of Paris Hotels, the "Fast Facts" include the country, language,
> currenty and telephone country code.
>
> Additional hand picked results appear below the Top Seven, and Google
> results round out the query.
>
> Also in the right sidebar is a place for users who've registered with
> the site to submit links relevant to the query. The more users who've
> submitted a unique link, the higher it appears on the list. Mahalo
> will be looking for fraud in this area - if a guide determines a link
> to be spammy, they will ban the link, the user and the user's IP
> address "forever." However, if a link gets enough votes and is
> determined to be relevant by the guides, it will move over into the
> main search results area.
>
> Each search page also has a discussion/forum area, where any
> registered user can add their thoughts to what's included on the
> results page.
>
> Mahalo has 40 full time guides today and have created 4,000 results
> pages - each of which will serve approximately 12 various queries.
> Calacanis says that the guides are steadily improving results and
> adding more queries - they expect to have 10,000 by end of year, and
> 25,000 by end of 2008.
>
> They are really focusing on top search terms, which they obtain from a
> number of search engines and other sources, Calacanis says. If a user
> makes a query that has no Mahalo results, they are given Google
> results instead. Calacanis stressed that it is going to take them a
> couple of years to get really deep results for most queries - until
> the end of 2007 the site will be in Alpha, and will be in beta for all
> of 2008.  "It takes a few years to build a really compelling search
> engine," he said.
>
> Mahalo has now completed two rounds of financing. The first was led by
> Sequoia Capital. The second was led by Elon Musk and News Corp. The
> size of the rounds have not been disclosed, but Calacanis says he has
> enough capital to run the business for up to four years without
> revenue.
>
> Disclosure: We have no financial interest in Mahalo; however, Jason
> Calacanis is our partner on our upcoming TechCrunch20 Conference.
>
> --
> Seth Finkelstein  Consulting Programmer  http://sethf.com/
> Infothought blog - http://sethf.com/infothought/blog/
> Interview: http://sethf.com/essays/major/greplaw-interview.php
> _______________________________________________
> Search-l mailing list
> Search-l at wikia.com
> http://lists.wikia.com/mailman/listinfo/search-l
> Change options or unsubscribe: http://lists.wikia.com/mailman/options/search-l
>


-- 

---------------------
Jason McCabe Calacanis
Entrepreneur in Action, Sequoia Capital
Mobile: 310-456-4900
My blog: http://www.calacanis.com
AOL IM/Skype: jasoncalacanis

If you want to subscribe to my Podcast go to iTunes and select
"Advanced" then "Subscribe to Podcast" and add this feed:
http://podcast.calacanis.com/rss.xml

... or just click this link:
http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?id=204314545