New Search Engine Cuil Launches But Something is Amiss
Menlo Park based Cuil has officially launched with quite a sizable index of 120 billion web pages, making them arguably a comprehensive search engine on the web. Cuil not only claims that they have found a way to massively reduce the costs involved in indexing the web and how they handle search queries (Google spends a billion dollars a year to run the back end infrastructure of it’s search business), they also make the boastful claims to have better search results than Google and others based on how they index websites.
However, when I conduct a vanity search for my own name, I get the following set of results (click to see a larger view).
I am glad that a link to this blog shows up as the # 1 result. However, look at what shows up in the rest of the results.
- # 2 – Yes that is my beautiful mug but that is not a listing for me but rather, David Wallace – the governor of Indiana back in the 1800′s.
- # 3 – Links to a Wikipedia page that lists several entries they have for David Wallaces. While this may be relevant, it has a Goofy cartoon image next to it, the very same image I use many times as my avatar in various places on the Internet.
- # 4 – Links to my personal blog but that is not a picture of me.
- # 10 – Links to David Wallace Croft’s “about” page but that is not a picture of him next to the listing but rather of me.
I see the same sort of thing happening on subsequent pages.
I’m not even going to conduct any further searches as you have already lost me, Cuil. There is obviously something wrong with your correlation between images and search listings.
About the Author: David Wallace, co-founder and CEO of SearchRank, is a recognized expert in the industry of search and social media marketing. Since 1997, David has been involved in developing successful search engine and social media marketing campaigns for large and small businesses. Follow 
Jim Gaudet | Jul 28, 2008 | Reply
435Agreed, I did a search for Fantasy Football and there were no results. Then I did one for just Football and nothing.
Could they have not indexed nfl.com yet?
~ Jim
Darrell Long | Jul 28, 2008 | Reply
436So your telling me your not from the 1800′s. Darn! lol
Wulffy | Jul 28, 2008 | Reply
438Ohh, bad search engine. I gave it a try, but the results are bad. First they do great promotion and later they try to fix their problems. The other way around would be more recommended.
Arnie | Jul 28, 2008 | Reply
437I searched for my name … zero results, while Google has almost 6,000. And seeing they have no results for “football”, they have lost me too.
Matt Keegan | Jul 28, 2008 | Reply
439It is a disappointing start for Cuil. Hopefully, they’ll iron out the problems and serve up good results soon. Otherwise, I’ll stick with Google.
random | Jul 28, 2008 | Reply
440their images are horribly tied to incorrect sites. amusing if anything. won’t be going back there to see any other disjointed information!
Net Magellan | Jul 28, 2008 | Reply
441Yes, strange corresponding images – one of our sites is shown next to an Autism organisation and another with a major bank’s logo.
Utah SEO | Jul 29, 2008 | Reply
442That is the funniest thing, I have read yet. Supposedly the engineers are from Google right? I don’t think anyone is too impressed as of yet.
Internet Marketing Joy | Jul 29, 2008 | Reply
443The over all look of the site looks really neat..I just hope they will sort out the problems sooner..^^
Susann Stjernborg | Jul 29, 2008 | Reply
444It is really not funny having my logo and some of my favorite photos displayed with just any site out there, that fits the search criteria.
I consider this a violation of copyright.
Nick Stamoulis | Jul 29, 2008 | Reply
445They definitely should have sorted out the bugs and then some before boasting that they’re better their Google – quite ballsy!
David Wallace | Jul 29, 2008 | Reply
446@Susann Stjernborg – No doubt. I wonder how long before the lawsuits start coming their way.
electric actuator | Jul 31, 2008 | Reply
447Actually, i also typed my name, and the results were really bad. I don’t think they will have the capacity to beat Google.
Jerky | Aug 14, 2008 | Reply
448Yeah! google is the best and no one can beat it. I really love google no matter what.
Internet Games | Aug 15, 2008 | Reply
449They should have thought of a better name. When I first heard of cuil I pronounced it kee-ul. I guess it’s supposed to sound like “kewl”. Branding **** up in my opinion.
Suzanne | Sep 8, 2008 | Reply
464Something is really amiss there. When I first heard about Cuil I checked it out immediately. I did so with Google ages ago and found it wonderful. I have been a Google fan ever since they did help me find the information that I was looking for when I wrote my graduation thesis.
I hoped Cuil would bring in something like that again to the web. How I was wrong! The results are really not relevant, and that layout of blocks….? Yuk.
I’ll still be a Google fan for a long time.