Web search for local communities in the Highlands of Scotland: A self-tutoring guide MODULE III Alternatives to Google: some other search tools worth a try © Copyright Hans Zell Publishing Consultants 2011 Glais Bheinn, Lochcarron, Ross-shire IV54 8YB, Scotland, UK Email:
[email protected] Web: www.hanszell.co.uk Web search for local communities in the Highlands of Scotland: A self-tutoring guide MODULE I How to get the most out of Google Web search MODULE II A concise guide to Google products, services, applications, and other offerings MODULE III Alternatives to Google: some other search tools worth a try MODULE IV The best of the Web: a guide to some of the most information-rich resources on the Internet 2 Introduction Google is a marvellous Web search tool and is as good as they get at present, but it is certainly not the only one. Other top search engines include Ask.com (aka as Ask Jeeves), Bing (formerly called MSN Search), and Yahoo! (and see General purpose, product, and visual search engines below). According to data published by Experian Hitwise http://www.hitwise.com/us/datacenter/main/dashboard-23984.html in June 2011, Google still heavily dominates the market with a share of about 68%, while the market share of Yahoo and Microsoft’s Bing currently is something just under 14% for both; Ask.com is in fourth place with around 2.6%, and AOL Search in fifth place with about 1.4%. The picture is roughly the same if ranked by number of visits, although Bing does better than Yahoo in this category.