Eurekster
Eurekster was a New Zealand-based company that built social search engines for use on websites, which were referred to as "swickis" (for "search plus wiki"[1]). The company was based in Christchurch, with an office in San Francisco, California. It was co-founded by Grant Ryan and Steven Marder, who served as its chief scientist and CEO, respectively. Ryan is also the co-founder and chairman of the Christchurch-based company SLI Systems, which specialize in search engines that learns from users.[2] According to Marder, "Eurekster pioneered vertical, social search..."[3]
Eurekster launched to the public on 21 January 2004.[4]
In 2007, Eurekster hosted around 100,000 swickis[3] for various websites, which total approximately 20 million searches per month,[5] or around 800,000 searches per day.[6]
The company shut down sometime after 2010.[7]
Praise
In 2006, Mark Cuban praised Eurekster's product on his blog: "Add their search engine to your site. They will rank results based on what actions people who search from your site take... and show results that maximize relevance to the sites' community."[8]
In May 2006, Red Herring selected Eurekster as one of their favorite companies that push the technological limits in North America.[9]
Eurekster was, on 17 January 2007, announced one of the 100 best companies by AlwaysOn Media 100. The selection was made by focusing on "innovation, market potential, commercialization, stakeholder value creation, and media attention or 'buzz'".[10]
References
- ^ Eurekster ready to Digg? Market Watch Blog, 25 January 2007
- ^ Eurekster management
- ^ a b Eurekster Selected by AlwaysOn Media as Top 100 Private Company Award Winner Recognized for Leadership in Emerging Technology dBusinessNews. 18 January 2007.
- ^ Sullivan, Danny: Eurekster Launches Personalized Social Search 21 January 2004
- ^ Griffin, Peter (13 January 2007). "Riding high-tech wave to success". The New Zealand Herald. Retrieved 30 September 2011.
- ^ Enge, Eric. Are Vertical Search Engines the Answer to Relevance? Search Engine Watch, 3 January 2007.
- ^ Eurekster | crunchbase
- ^ Cuban, Mark. Eurekster & The Best Sales Idea I have seen in a long time 15 April 2006
- ^ Utter, David A. Eurekster Reels In Red Herring Award WebProNews, 23 May 2006
- ^ AlwaysOn Unveils the AO Media 100 Winners 17 January 2007