Searching for results in the next dimension
Search has become the single-largest activity on the Web. It has become impossible to imagine an innovative Web service or site that doesn’t take advantage of search to make users happy or sell things to potential customers.
One startup, SpaceTime, (spacetime.com) is offering a new and improved version of search that tries to maximize the way viewers see results.
Its beta version of SpaceTime3D takes two-dimensional results and renders them instead in a way that approximates three dimensions.
You have to download the SpaceTime software, but it’s not a bulky installation. (It’s available only for Windows users at this point.)
Its search start point lets you search from any of the major engines. The results start — at first — in traditional rectangular results boxes, each with the 10 blue links we’ve come to expect.
But if you have multiple pages of results, SpaceTime lets you flip from page to page like moving through a rolodex.
If you see any single result you want, click on the link and it opens in the usual way.
That floating 3-D display means you can quickly scroll to more “distant” or lower results much faster than with normal search.
The other nice improvement is the addition of a left-side panel that lets you collect or save recent or previously executed searches. With a quick mouse click you can reload all those previous results in the main window.
That produces a potentially varied set of rectangles (each holding 10 results) that SpaceTime3D lets you flip through quickly.
The navigation, in this beta version, is all linear, with each page of results rolling off the screen either to the left or to the right. It’s possible SpaceTime will develop the added “internal” dimension that lets users dive into each set of links and continue diving “into” a results page, rather than just loading a new page each click.
SpaceTime3D requires at least 512 megabytes of RAM to get results. The better the video card your system has, the better off you’ll be.
New and improved Ask3D
The world’s fourth-most popular search site, Ask.com, is also looking for more creative ways to use the desktop and give users more useful results.
Its new version, now called Ask3D, attempts to figure out where the searcher is going and anticipate the specific nuances of a question or inquiry.
Plug in a search term and the window divides into a small left side panel and a main panel with 10 organic results (the “10 blue links”). Some “sponsored” results may also appear.
The left side panel allows the search to be narrowed or expanded, depending on what you might need.
Type “Paul McCartney” into the Ask search box and the left side panel offers choices: Narrow the search and find Paul’s biography. Or expand the search and find links to Ringo Starr, John Lennon, or The Beatles.
In some cases, like this search, a right-side panel will also load. In that panel the choices delve into types of information: images, news, video, even in this case, musical tracks you can listen to online.
Based on this version, Ask deserves a higher ranking than fourth, in our opinion.