Wolfram Alpha: The Next Search Engine?
Another next-generation search engine launches. It looks more differentiated than the much-ado-about-nothing known as Cuil, but that’s not saying much.
Our prediction: Wolfram Alpha (terrible name) will see a nice spike in traffic for a few days, then it will disappear unnoticed along with all the other “next-generation” search engines.
Why?
Because search isn’t broken. It can be improved, yes, and companies like Wolfram Alpha will show Google how to improve it. But no search engine we’ve seen, including this one, comes close to making the quantum leap in performance required to get real volumes of Internet users to switch.