Coming from someone who doesn’t have a lot of time on her hands, having to learn how to use a search engine does not appeal to me when I have Google available. Of course I took the time to learn about Blekko, but I’m in the industry. I don’t think the average person will want to do that.

I’ve done some research and I think the best new search engine is Bweezy. Similar name, but very different from Blekko. Bweezy offers Google results, which I love. It also lets you open search results in the same window as the search, which eliminates the need to open a ton of tabs! I’d check it out if you’re into new search engines.

2. It really only seems an RSS reader with search and sharing ability via “command line” type feel. Great for us nerds, but complicated for the average user.

3. qrobe.it, when it is working, also has slash tags and getting more – blekko did not set this trend. However, you don’t have to sign in for qrobe.it

He also has a good discussion of curated search and its limitations. I would argue the real challenge is how to fill the gap between simple curated search and the algorithmic engines. So, how can users contribute in an intuitive and powerful way (including but going beyond directly editing individual query results or slashtags), while also not discarding the algorithm and machine learning tools of the engines. One gives you insight, the other coverage.

They try to walk a fine line on SEO and spam that may not exist. They say they hate spam, but they also advertise their usefulness for SEO. (I am not saying SEO=spam, just that such SEO tools are also useful for spammers.)

Their slashtags at first glance seem similar to restricting a search by topic or result cluster. That has been tried by various companies, and has not really taken off. Though it always sounds good at first.

The really interesting part is the ability for people to introduce and then PUBLISH their own slashtags. This relates to one of the major challenges in search, how to allow large numbers of people outside a search engine company (other search technology companies and experts, or domain experts without expertise in search technology) to make search better for others, by contributing small ideas and bits of knowledge.

But this is a really hard problem. It is hard to come up with the right way to open up an engine and expose its innards, and also hard to find the right way to create and motivate an ecosystem of contributors. Not convinced they have anything special to offer on the first aspect — a naive opening up of a search engine can create some buzz at first but if not done right contributions will soon fizzle out. But whoever solves this problem may start something big.