AI Favored Search 2.0 Solution

In the current Read/WriteWeb poll (see below), we're asking what 'search 2.0' concepts you think stand the best chance of beating Google. The results so far are interesting, because Artificial Intelligence is currently top pick - despite having a history of underachievement in the tech industry and there being no real AI search contenders yet. Hakia, which we profiled recently, is one such AI (or natural language processing) search engine. But Hakia is at this stage a fair way off being a finished product.

Poll results so far:

1. Artificial Intelligence (e.g. Hakia, Powerset) 23% (123 votes)

2. People Powered Search (e.g. del.icio.us, ChaCha) 21% (115 votes)

3. Vertical Search (e.g. SimplyHired, Technorati) 15% (81 votes)

4. Personalized Search (e.g. Collarity) 12% (63 votes)

5. Clustering (e.g. Clusty, SearchMash) 11% (58 votes)

6. Social Search (e.g. Eurekster, Rollyo) 7% (37 votes)

7. Visualization (e.g. Quintura and Kartoo) 6% (33 votes)

8. Previews (Snap, Live Image Search) 5% (25 votes)

Alex Iskold, in his R/WW post The Race to Beat Google, was skeptical of AI search:

"Based on what we have seen so far, it is difficult to see how these companies can beat Google. Firstly, being able to enter the query using natural language is already allowed by Google, so this is not a competitive difference. It must then be the actual results that are vastly better. Now that is really difficult to imagine. Somewhat better maybe, but vastly different? Unlikely."

But it seems R/WW readers beg to differ. 23% of you think AI search is the most likely approach to challenge Google.