Powerset a San Francisco based start-up, on Sunday unveiled tools for searching Wikipedia that use conversational phrasing instead of keywords.
This could be the first step of its challenge to established Web search services such as Google.
The technology used by Powerset breaks down the meaning of words and sentences into related concepts, freeing users from always needing to type the exact words they want to find.
This Silicon Valley start-up is offering a way of searching millions of entries in Wikipedia’s online encyclopedia, helping users find detailed answers to questions rather than isolated links that require further research.
For example, a user who wants to know how many wives King Henry VIII had can find an answer via Powerset’s service at tinyurl.com/5qpcr9/.
Greg Sterling, an Internet analyst with Sterling Market Intelligence said:
The Wikipedia is becoming a microcosm of the most useful parts of the Web. This offers a powerful way to find what you are looking for against this subset of the Web
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Powerset is looking to beat the current generation of services that rely on keyword searches such as Google Inc, Yahoo Inc, Microsoft Corp and IAC InterActiveCorp’s Ask.com.
While it is still a long way from letting users search the World Wide Web, Powerset is using Wikipedia as a trial showcase for how its technology can be used to search a vast number of other websites using natural language phrases or questions. It is yet to be seen how this technology will compete with Google’s own search. According to Sterling:
What I don’t know is how Powerset will perform on the wide open Web. In a sense, this is a massive prototype using the relatively structured information of Wikipedia. It is difficult to compare to what Google has built.
Over time, it aims to partner with other high-quality data sites where information can be organized in a question and answer form that lends itself to Powerset search techniques. Examples might include financial or patent filings, the CIA Factbook or Wikipedia-inspired clones, company officials said.
Powerset looks beyond words to try to understand conceptual relationships that get closer to what a user may be searching for. It analyzes each sentence and whole documents to do so.
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