11 April 2006

Revolutionary search algorithm bought by Google

Following talks with the big three internet search operators, Google has just announced the high-profile signing of a student from the University of New South Wales. Since Microsoft founder Bill Gates last year praised the search engine algorithm tool called Orion, developed by PhD student Ori Allon at New South Wales' School of Computer Science, there has been some speculation as to who would eventually acquire it. The declaration by Google that it had hired Ori Allon and bought the rights to the advanced text search algorithm for an undisclosed sum has now lead to further conjectures being made within the industry. Google is well known for making big plays within the search industry, and given Google's desire to continue dominating the search business the deal could potentially be worth millions and help to revolutionise the way people search. Then again, it is also possible that it could be just another one of the many research projects that Google has taken on in the past which then simply gets shelved. Another possibility is that it may just be a move made to block the competition.

Orion works as an add-on to existing search engines to improve the relevance of searches and works by finding pages where the relevancy of the content is strongly related to the key words being searched for. The algorithm then returns extra information to the searcher by providing expanded text sections of the page to the user, as well as listing other topics which may be related to the query. This means that the searcher will be provided with what should be the relevant information without actually having to visit the website.

Ori Allon said about Orion that, "By displaying results to other associated key words directly related to your search topic, you gain additional pertinent information that you might not have originally conceived, thus offering an expert search without having an expert's knowledge."

When questioned about the impact that this might have on the traffic to websites and the subsequent effect on web publishers, Allon replied:

"I don't envision that Orion will completely eliminate the need for going to actual web pages but rather expedite the search process. It could also result in the user going to more web pages since they will be alerted to other keywords related to their search."

The Orion tool has been designed to help complement searches conducted on any of the existing search services such as Google, Yahoo or MSN Search, but following the purchase by Google - of the tool and the creator - we may see search being taken in a new direction by Google, while their competitors struggle to catch up.

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