Type of site | search engine |
|---|---|
| Available in | English |
| Owner | SearchMe |
| Created by | SearchMe |
| Registration | no |
| Launched | January 17, 2007 |
| Current status | Inactive |
Wikiseek was asearch engine that indexedEnglish Wikipedia pages and pages that were linked to from Wikipedia articles.[1] The search engine was funded by aPalo Alto basedInternet startupSearchMe and was officially launched on January 17, 2007.[1][2] Most of the funding came fromSequoia Capital.[3] It usedGoogle ads on its search returns to generate profit. As of 2008 it is no longer active.
Wikiseek was granted permission by theWikimedia Foundation to index the Wikipedia website.[2] Wikiseek has made financial contributions to the Wikimedia Foundation,[2] and the group-edited blog,TechCrunch reported that it was donating the "majority" of advertising revenue.[1]
Wikipedia pages were re-indexed whenever Wikipedia had a database clean-up; external links were re-indexed weekly.[2] Search results includedtag clouds of Wikipedia categories that contained the search term.[1] The first three results of any search would always be Wikipedia articles, and the remainder were a mix of Wikipedia content and websites linked to from Wikipedia.[1] The service used user feedback to reduce the likelihood of spam.[3]
TechCrunch commented that the search engine may cause confusion with theWikiasearch engine that had been announced the month previous to Wikiseek's launch.[1]
