Weird Search Engines II: Beam Me Up, Scotty

Last Friday we posted about
weird search
engines. We got some good comments and found some new weird search engines to add to
our list. Note that we mean weird in a good way – as in something a bit different.

To remind you, here are the original ‘weird’ search engines:

In the comments, we got these new ones:

Winzy
– win prizes while searching

There’s good review at everybody go to,
where ap0ria says in the comments:

“Is this for real??? I saw your post on read/write decided
to check it out. I won a shuffle on my second search. Just wondering if anyone has
actually gotten anything from them before I give them my home address.”

Let us know ap0ria if you do receive that ipod
shuffle…

ujiko.com – Dr Spock’s search engine?

Rafe Needleman on CNET points
to an unusual UI from Kartoo, at ujiko.com. Rafe
describes it:

“…[it] looks like a search engine that the Star Trek set designers would
build. It shows results in a bizarre oval menu with an open center section where the user
can flag particular results as relevant. This input helps narrow down results. The center
section also shows how terms in multiple results relate to each other, using a wheel of
color codes attached to individual results. I think you need Spock’s brain to interpret
the data. That said, it’s entertaining to use and does return useful and very specific
results.”

Here’s a screenshot:

adverlicio.us – a search engine (of sorts)
for online advertisements. Complete with an automatic pop-up ‘about us’.

goyams.com – a meta search engine where
you can weight your results:

Tall Street – a search engine where
you trade the results like a stock market.

GoodLuckFinder.com, a mystical search engine described
as follows:

“Supreme forces always influenced people’s choice. In the present-day world it is
getting more and more difficult for the Providence to help people make their choices
– the Spirit of Luck is unable to influence search engine results. However, the
weather and solar activity are still entirely at the mercy of the supreme forces.

GoodLuckFinder.com picks a word out of your list according to unique weather
conditions (the data comes from weather stations in real-time mode) or solar activity.
The Spirit of Luck sees the words entered by you, insignificantly changes the weather
(for instance, temperature changes by a few fractions of a grade) and tells you what your
luck lies in.”

Let us know of any other weird search engines you come across…