Will Powerset Have PowerGrowth?
Michael Arrington
29 comments »
Any serious Internet startup tries to guess early growth rates so that they have enough hardware to scale (hopefully the software hangs in there, too). Stealth search engine Powerset (see our earlier coverage) is being very transparent about their modelling, and have posted some of their thinking on their company blog.
Steve Newcomb, co-founder and COO, wrote the post and goes into considerable detail as to how they built the predictive model. The graph above shows Newcomb’s model as applied to a competitor - Snap.com, after the new Snap Preview Anywhere release and its re-launch of its product.
The shaded area shows predicted growth and the actual results are shown by the blue line. Not a bad job, although I assume they tweaked the model quite a bit to make it fit.
Powerset should publish the model itself (without the specific Powerset assumptions of course) and let other startups tweak it for their own use. Most new companies don’t have the excel jockeys or the time to do this kind of work. Any competitive issues would be overshadowed by the considerable goodwill (and link juice) they’d get from doing this.
Great idea Mike. It would be great if more companies not only shared core application source code but also business intelligence tools as well. Good thinking.
.. or just build your system so that unforeseen growth can be handled by EC2 instances.
I’m not saying Powerset should be taking this approach because I don’t know their technology. But the EC2 approach will work for most startups if done right.
It makes more sense to me anyhow - why buy all those servers to handle the initial spike when those same servers aren’t going to be needed again for 11-12 months?
Regardless it’s an interesting post. Cheers.
When will we get to try this search? I still think social based search is the way to go - e.g. digg except for search.
#3
In this CNBC interview the CEO says beta end of this year.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v.....squ%2Ehtml
I don’t think Powerset will launch before 2010… Hype hype hype
Riiiiight. You cannot “predict” traffic patterns based on other people’s traffic since uptake among consumers are VERY subjective.
I would suggest PowerSet to model against the traffic patterns of 99% of the startups that TechCrunch profiles — Initial TC induced spike… followed by a short and steep decline of traffic.. followed by a constant flat line.
However I don’t think the VC’s are going to be happy with THAT sort of prediction, hence a more favorable “model” is needed. LOL.
Powerset isn’t social search, your thinking http://www.tallstreet.com/
Oh yeah, I predict PowerSet will be the Web2.0’s equivalent of Ginger aka IT aka Segway HT.
http://www.alexa.com/data/deta.....werset.com
People see it — vaporware!
#9 - Take it easy, man. Powerset hasn’t launched yet.
> Steve Newcomb, co-founder and COO goes into considerable detail as to how they built the predictive model
Ate we talking economic theory or does this company Powerset really have something that transcends the Internet Search engine status quo.
Sounds like empty puffery to me !
“People see it — vaporware!”
Are you seriously this stupid? Anyone that read the article would understand the discussion was around how Powerset intends to scale. Scaling intelligently requires them to try and predict traffic and they used SNAP in the example above. AFAIK, Powerset may launch a beta by the end of the year, so of course there’s no traffic.
We can all recognize you and your 2nd grade English skills across all your anonymous posts. It really is sad…
It will be interesting to see just how this grows. I just can’t see another search engine coming into the fray when Google so obviously dominates the market. I’m not trying to discourage anyone, just call me a realist. Not to mention that Powerset isn’t exactly a name that stands out when you think of search engines. Maybe if it was Powersearch or something. They have a lot of barriers that servers can’t knock down for them.
Kelli - at least this time around folks are THINKING about a google killer. I think when google took over yahoo and the likes, it happened with so little hype–I doubt Yahoo was expecting such a surprise in its wildest dreams.
Seeing how google came about, I do think that the google killer(and there will be one) won’t be a result of hype or tonnes of VC money. It’ll start by group of few LOW KEY guys making a clearly more useful search than google…however that may be.
right, so the key will be to continue to monitor them and any company like them to see if they are providing additional value. If google fails to recognize the value being (or potentiall being) added, it could be a “killer”. More than likely if there’s a worthy technology, it will be acquired. In theory, hiring enormous numbers of Ph.D.s will get you accurate assessments.
er. Hope they didn’t spend too much time or effort on it - Googling “Gartner hype curve” might have saved them the work…
Hype hype and more hype. Show us the product already. Photoshopped average graph is not enough.
I hate it when attention is given to Hype.
The company has yet to launch anything and you give it how much coverage over the last few months ?
Mike , its pathetic and shows your running out of material
There are persistent rumors from inside Powerset that Powerset is not the name their search engine will launch with.
@19:S
“There are persistent rumors from inside Powerset that Powerset is not the name their search engine will launch with.”
WHOOP DEE DOO!!! Who gives a crap? If Google is going to launch an Web Browser, we might care what they name it. But as of now, PowerSet is just a bunch of hot freaking air… and 99% of overhyped companies ultimately fail to deliver.
If you seriously type that “We can all recognize you and your 2nd grade English skills across all your anonymous posts. It really is sad…”
Did I ever flame you?
I’m starting to believe that PowerSet search is a legend like Big Foot. Where is it already?
http://www.ebizmba.com
First, I don’t know what’s behind powerset’s hype or “Hype, hype, hype thing”. Somehow, I enter powerset offical site… You see nothing, but just mocking question mark.
This is word to use when a startup launches product.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vaporware
I don’t know how powerset get VC money when they launch sealth mode. As reader, the answers I’m looking forward too.
1. Will powerset change the world?
2. Is powerset going to be like segway?
3. Is powerset search engine hoax?
4. Is powerset another hakia clone?
5. How many engineers did you hire so far?
6. What are your plans in ten years after competing google?
7. Is powerset anti-google company?
8. How do you define “HYPE” in powerset?
9. According to Wayback archive. Did you ever hack into Google code?
10. Do you believe in Google’s “Do no evil” philosophy?
I want to know how do startups use VC money?
I’ve never seen a company with no product get this much hype, who cares
The guy doesn’t even know how to spell ALGORITHM:
“unique search growth algorythms.” (sic)
This model has hYpe (with a Y that’s right) written all over it…. (I feel I heard a bad consultant speak…. top down blahblah bottom up…)
Did he use a bullshYt generator or what?