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January 2, 2008

The Next Google Search Challenger: Blekko

Michael Arrington

66 comments »

Rich Skrenta, who created the first computer virus (Elk Cloner), co-founded the Open Directory Project, and co-founded online news site Topix, may have bitten off the biggest challenge of his career - taking on Google. In search.

Skrenta left Topix last June. He started his new company, Blekko, almost immediately, along with five others from the Topix core team. They raised $2 million in seed funding in September from Baseline Ventures, two early Googlers (David DesJardins and Jeremy Wenokur), and the founding team.

The company is still deep in stealth and, apparently, working out of a garage in true startup style (see image below). The Blekko website, which today has nothing on it except a picture of a puppet created by Skrenta’s daughter, isn’t even close to having a landing page up, let alone the final product. But eventually Skrenta says they’ll launch a full scale search engine to compete with the big guys.

Skrenta, who’s very media savvy, won’t say much about how he’s going to tackle search (he’s not a fan of PageRank though:“PageRank wrecked the web. Google is the cause of all of this. and Google is going down with it.”). He says they are looking at improvements on the back end (indexing and query serving) as well as the user search experience itself. Beyond that, he says we have to wait. And it might be a long wait at that. The company, Skrenta says, may not have a public prototype available until 2009.

Normally an entrepreneur announcing they’re taking on Google with a six person team and just $2 million in funding would either be laughed at or ignored. In Skrenta’s case, he has proven himself more than once as capable of taking on big challenges and winning. This will be a company to watch, and speculate on, in 2008.

There are other promising search startups out there. Powerset, Cuill (we’ll be hearing more about them soon) and the upcoming Wikia Search Engine are all yet to launch. Mahalo is growing fast (but still tiny). Can anyone unseat Google? Perhaps not any time soon. But you don’t have to get much market share to be a huge winner in this space - every 1%, they say, is worth a cool billion dollars.

CrunchBase Information
Blekko
Rich Skrenta
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This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 2nd, 2008 at 6:50 pm and is filed under Company & Product Profiles. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

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Comments

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  1. Jon

    January 2nd, 2008 at 6:57 pm

    Michael, you forget Google started off with just two people, it would only make sense that two other people can present a challenge as they did against Yahoo way back when ;-)

    Jon

  2. Michael Arrington

    January 2nd, 2008 at 6:59 pm

    Jon - I agree, but Yahoo was no Google, even back before Google was Google. Back then, search was a cost center, now it’s a massive business that gets massive attention. All because of a little startup called GoTo (renamed Overture).

  3. chrisw

    January 2nd, 2008 at 7:08 pm

    “PageRank wrecked the web. Google is the cause of all of this. and Google is going down with it.” - that’s a pretty bold statement. I agree, this will be one to watch closely.

  4. Allen Stern

    January 2nd, 2008 at 7:08 pm

    This might sound odd - but that 1% search market worth billions might mean something for yahoo or google, maybe even ask, but for the smaller players, would it mean the same?

    In fact, using Mahalo as an example, even if they grow from the currently tiny size, they are using Google ads, so wouldn’t google still be the one to profit from the increase? And even if they grew to 1%, then being able to maximize that revenue into $1B will be very difficult - it’s not the same as G/Y adding on another 1%.

    You can substitute any search engine in place of Mahalo used above. I hope this makes sense. I could work up a diagram perhaps.

  5. Louis Gray

    January 2nd, 2008 at 7:09 pm

    Google didn’t win because they said they were going to be the next Google. They started out very simple, and it was through offering a better product and word of mouth, and extremely intelligent, focused, engineering. Skrenta is doing the right thing to be quiet, if this is his plan - but even if he nailed search, Google has grown to be so much more now… and by 2009, it’ll have grown again. We’ll be watching.

  6. Andrew

    January 2nd, 2008 at 7:09 pm

    hopefully they’ll change the name

  7. Technicle

    January 2nd, 2008 at 7:22 pm

    ex-boo.com still available.

  8. damon

    January 2nd, 2008 at 7:23 pm

    powerset, have they not lost all credibility yet, what with their goofy contrived demos and their excel spreadsheet “model”

  9. Jon

    January 2nd, 2008 at 7:33 pm

    I totally agree with you on that one Michael… the problem with Yahoo (which helped Google tremendously) is that they diversified themselves into nothingness. Yahoo, in trying to please too many people, made itself redundant and thus, gave the little sapling that was Google just enough light to get through the canopy of search engines. Google has since dominated the forest of the net but we all know that todays dominant tree is tomorrows mulch ;-)

    Jon

  10. alexanderpink

    January 2nd, 2008 at 7:35 pm

    scarecrow escaped?

  11. Gabe

    January 2nd, 2008 at 7:39 pm

    Very happy, for the sake of Techmeme, to see another contender not afraid to trash talk the big G. Good luck with that Rich (and Mike Markson, etc.)! Now a rebranding might be in order, but there’s…plenty…of time for that. Whatever you do, please don’t change the mascot!

  12. mike

    January 2nd, 2008 at 7:42 pm

    Allen you bring up a good point re: monetization - if we use Google ads to monetize the site, Google would certainly get their share. How much they get, well, that would depend on the deal cut. Perhaps even more troublesome though is that Google requires “Ads By Google” to be shown with the ads themselves - i.e. an ad for the market leader shown for every monetizeable search. Its tough to win market share when you’re advertising for the competition. All stuff to think about as we move forward…

  13. Carolynn

    January 2nd, 2008 at 7:57 pm

    Although, let’s not encourage entrepreneurs to say “If we only get 1% of the market, we project astronomical ROI by year 3…!”

  14. somestranger

    January 2nd, 2008 at 7:59 pm

    we’re going to be the next insert-famous-company-here = founder with an ego greater than his brains = failure.

    Innovation doesn’t occur when trying to be the next Google. Some people never learn. Even those who blog about such companies and rely on misguiding facts such as “experience” or “previous success”.

  15. Michael Lodispoto

    January 2nd, 2008 at 8:05 pm

    With regards to Yahoo never being like Google. That’s true but what would Google be without Yahoo? There’s a big relationship there for a long time in internet years.
    Also does anyone find it interesting that search engines like Mahalo and earthfrisk.org use Google ads? It was found in that our own field studies we were told that Google’s text ads are the most respected on the internet and by readers.
    It does make it harder to even advance the idea that opposing search engines can attempt to beat Google while actually using them to serve advertisements. As the founder of one who is doing the same It’s an interesting fact of life on the internet. Friend and foe, love them and hate them. You still deal with and really do have one weird relationship with Google. Having been someone who admires entrepreneurship I’m sure we all would quickly say that it’s a true story of ingenuity and business excellence. Google is one of those stories that people who are alive now will be talking about for generations.

  16. Randy

    January 2nd, 2008 at 8:37 pm

    Why would we support a virus writer past or present…?

  17. Roman

    January 2nd, 2008 at 8:49 pm

    Blekko has a long way to go. Much of the SEO industry is focused on pagerank and tuning sites for google searches. Blekko not only has to build a product but convince an industry to shift its focus to their product and model.

  18. David Scott Lewis

    January 2nd, 2008 at 8:51 pm

    Mahalo is in a different league. (Not a better league, just a different league.)

    Creating “Directory 2.0″ (as Jason himself called it in a tweet) the way he is doing it is labor intensive.

    Enter offshoring. I can’t see where any of Mahalo’s competitors can fully take advantage of offshoring the same way Mahalo can.

    But this can also create a relatively low barrier to entry, especially when brand loyalty won’t easily be sustainable.

  19. James

    January 2nd, 2008 at 9:35 pm

    While Google is entrenched on both the publisher side and the advertiser side, a more effective search could easily draw users. But the bigger problem is, many of us who do use Google every day have learned to use Google naturally.

    A new product needs to not only work better and drive better results to the user, but be something that can easily appeal to both people built to search with Google logic and more average users.

    In regards to the monetization comment above, I think the biggest mistake they could make is utilizing Google as the key source of revenue (actually, I think that’s the biggest mistake any serious start up can make). Aside from the obvious concerns of a search engine competing with Google using Google Ads, all it does is lower the floor of your pricing to a ridiculously low point. Although I’m not a fan of the magical “Build It and Money Will Appear” approach, even that seems better than devaluing a major revenue stream through Google.

  20. iverevi

    January 2nd, 2008 at 9:41 pm

    How did Google ruin the web? What’s so bad about PageRank? Just curious.

    (Ok, after I typed these questions, I decided to google: google ruined web pagerank. The first result gave me Rich Skrenta’s blog with his answer. Basically, “G” is “paid” on both sides–the spam and the users. But without Google, how would I have found this out???)

  21. Presentation maybe require

    January 2nd, 2008 at 9:44 pm

    Never ask for VC money and do stealth mode search engine. Doing search engine business is scary as hell. Many investors will force you do presentation right front of 20,000 people. How scary is that?

    You stand up in the middle stage. You look at killer’s eyes of 20,000 people and rivals(Google, Yahoo, Live). Your throat chokes up. Your legs wobble. You feel sweaty. You bladder won’t hold that long. You paper starts to shake.

    TIPS:

    1.) don’t crying
    2.) don’t pee right front of 20,000 people.
    3.) be careful with future rivals.
    4.) Microsoft owns Live. If you flip it backwards. It’s spell evil.
    5.) Google & Yahoo will destroy every piece you make.
    6.) don’t claim you invented search engine.
    7.) be careful with government setting up rivals.
    8.) move away from Good vs. evil stuff.
    9.) never show off
    10.)Be careful with Microsoft.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WyBpJqPOhvg
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=im589uTchKs

    see 5:25 a guy point bill gates;

    P.S. Good luck you guys.

  22. Clement

    January 2nd, 2008 at 11:04 pm

    Google will buy Blekko if they prove to be successful.

  23. Hackaback

    January 3rd, 2008 at 1:10 am

    Let’s hope that google’s “Don’t be Evil” policy works this time toooo

  24. Darren

    January 3rd, 2008 at 1:21 am

    @21 not really, lets face if they are sucessful they will not need the money and seeing the size that google grew too they can see the prize. I get the feeling that google are going to be seen as their number one enemy so I can’t see them selling out to them.

    I think the name is crap but if they bring back better results that google then I’ll use them because I am getting fed up having to fine tune my search queries a lot more these days. I also hate the way google seems to point you to local results over foriegn ones when you are trying to get the foriegn ones.

  25. Google²+eBay²=Uniseek

    January 3rd, 2008 at 1:24 am

    I think Google has greatly enhanced the web experience. We’d be at a loss without having ‘googled’ everything we did (as it would have probably taken more time to find what we were looking for, if we found it at all).

    But Google is only great for searching static websites. (And I don’t just say that because my company, Uniseek, will be a competitor.)

    Why can’t I go to Google and ask it to search for ‘things that move’? Live things, like travel products, movie tickets, job listings, videos, and social websites? Why does Google Base exist separately from Google search? It’s because Google hasn’t yet figured it out.

    We believe the future of relevant search is in users ‘pushing’ relevancy to servers, rather than servers going out to find what is relevant. The web is people-powered, and searching should be also. Machines seem to do a great job at predicting what users will find relevant (with the right algorithm) but ultimately it is the right combination of user activity that will most accurately determine what other users will find relevant.

    That’s why I think companies like Digg are sitting on a goldmine. I wouldn’t be surprised if Google lost market share to Digg in a few years.

  26. tom

    January 3rd, 2008 at 1:32 am

    have to agree that pagerank has killed the web. the number of domain parkers and squaters outthere survive because of pagerank.

    Its so sad that these days most domains are gone because companies and individuals buy millions of domains and never use them.

  27. tom

    January 3rd, 2008 at 1:38 am

    and search is no longer about quality . its about who has the neatest tricks or the knowledge to scam google and get to the top of the tree.

    where is the user quality in that ?? , because hundreds or thousands of links are to my site means my site is google ? serp domination is now an industry with people gaming google daily. all people are caring about is getting to the top for their keywords rather than creating something of quality.

  28. Joey

    January 3rd, 2008 at 1:50 am

    Blekko is already my home page.

  29. saweeet

    January 3rd, 2008 at 2:12 am

    Maybe Blekko will randomly inspire google to “un-pagerank” their asses…and therefore smoke Blekko, and still remain omnipotent LOL! For competitive purposes. In the end im gonna use which ever one looks liek a nicer home page (liek igoogle gadgets) so aesthetic pleasure is an imparative for Blekko! (IMO)

    And Blekko dam well better not give me search results that yield to virus portals!

  30. Michael Mahemoff

    January 3rd, 2008 at 2:17 am

    “PageRank wrecked the web”

    LOL. There’s always room for improvement, but the web is certainly not wrecked. Email? Generally wrecked. Web? NOT wrecked.

  31. Prolific Programmer

    January 3rd, 2008 at 2:32 am

    Topix is the rudest company I’ve ever interviewed at. There is no way that anyone at a company that treats potential employees as they did is going to succeed.

  32. Fares Al-Osaimi

    January 3rd, 2008 at 2:55 am

    I welcome any competition to Google. Even 0.01% share is good enough. Competition is a good thing.

  33. Chuck

    January 3rd, 2008 at 3:21 am

    1. virus: FAIL
    2. ODP: FAIL
    3. Topix: FAIL

    I wouldn’t know Rich from a hole in the wall, but I can’t say I’m holding my breath.

    And Blekko? Sorry, but I can’t see that name “taking off”, either. It reminds me of “retching”.

    However, I am all for competition. Anything that helps make/keep Google honest is probably a good thing.

  34. Mike

    January 3rd, 2008 at 4:21 am

    Here’s another Cool search engine with ajax stuff inspire Sleeping and drinking and Sex http://www.WireSeek.com

  35. Jack @ The Tech Teapot

    January 3rd, 2008 at 5:12 am

    “PageRank wrecked the web. Google is the cause of all of this. and Google is going down with it.”

    If blekko is successful whatever mechanism it uses to rank pages will also wreck the web…each search engine has the seeds of its own destruction right at the beginning. In fact, the first thing a search engine invents is the seed of its own eventual destruction.

  36. Jack @ The Tech Teapot

    January 3rd, 2008 at 5:13 am

    “That’s why I think companies like Digg are sitting on a goldmine. I wouldn’t be surprised if Google lost market share to Digg in a few years.”

    You’re joking, right?

  37. Brent

    January 3rd, 2008 at 6:10 am

    @Randy:
    It displayed a poem on Apple II’s and the author was 15 yo. It should also be worth noting that generally when someone is the first to do something significant (good or bad), they are generally smart but young/naive at the time. See Robert Morris (now prof at MIT) of Morris Worm as another reference point.

  38. Gunnar Andreassen

    January 3rd, 2008 at 6:20 am

    Great scoop. Posting a link to this, thanks!

  39. Greg Andrew

    January 3rd, 2008 at 7:17 am

    The ODP does not count as a success. Topix appears to be a mild success, though I’m not aware of its financial s. Challenging Google is a lon, long shot no matter who you are. Its worth it because of the gold at the end of the rainbow for anyone who succeeds, but no one has a “good chance” to get there.

    As far as Google and pagerank ruining the web…please. Does anyone prefer the web of 5 years ago to now? Does anyone think it was easier to find something on the web with AltaVista in 1998 than it is now with Google?

    And can we please stop hearing about how Google challenged and overcame Yahoo? Yahoo was not in Google’s sights when Google started. Google’s competition was Alta Vista, Inktomi, maybe Excite and Infoseek, etc. Yahoo was not a search engine. It used other company’s search engines as a backup for people using Yahoo’s directory. Yahoo did not become truly interested in search until Google showed that there was a away of making money with it.

  40. Bob

    January 3rd, 2008 at 7:28 am

    Although it’s really hard to beat Google, But there should be some other company who can step forward in Search Engine World. If there will be any competitor - only then Google will get away from having ‘monopoly’.

  41. Brendon Wu

    January 3rd, 2008 at 7:42 am

    I’m laughing because the team is composed of “ex-Googlers”. Is that supposed to be a good thing? They should probably keep that to themselves, because ex-Googlers have never done anything.

    If they were all ex-PayPal, then I would be impressed ;)

  42. anonymous

    January 3rd, 2008 at 8:09 am

    What is this nonsense? There’s a gazillion startups out there already doing interesting things, and you choose to report on some spotfaces who might launch something in 2009. Man, you’re confused, you should join their startup.

  43. arun

    January 3rd, 2008 at 8:30 am

    With the spurt in number of search engienes i doubt that any new search engiene will be able to compete the big 3.

  44. whoopie

    January 3rd, 2008 at 9:00 am

    but hasn’t the once-incorrect comment finally proven true now - search is a commodity?

    try switching to y! search or msn.live search or ask.com for a few days…you will likely find as i have found that these engines have achieved google-level results quality

    and of course, google itself is still delivering google-quality results….

    the traction is in the ad market. search is “done” - anyone can download lucene and deliver decent results on any data set. if you want to make more money, deliver better ads

    i like skrenta and enjoy reading his blog, but i see a powerset-like spiral here

    even if powerset and blekko deliver a slightly better search, they are going to find that google has become a brand in the mind of consumerws, and breaking that mental model is incredibly difficult…if yahoo and msft can’t break google with their own good searches and big ad budgets…how can blekko?

  45. JustMe

    January 3rd, 2008 at 9:10 am

    Enough with the SnapShot pop-ups! I couldn’t even read the dang article because it kept getting covered, and you even put a SnapShot trigger on the photo. Truly, there is no safe way to scroll down you page.

  46. Mark

    January 3rd, 2008 at 10:16 am

    Great news if someone is in the mood to rub a crystal ball and talk about something that will, most likely, never happen. Sorry but let us know when they have something I can at least even remotely consider using.

    #42, right on.

  47. Tim

    January 3rd, 2008 at 10:44 am

    Did they choose blekko because it was the best 6 letter domain they could get there hands on? What a stupid name. I don’t see myself switching any time soon. This is nothing but hype. I’m not impressed.

  48. Marc

    January 3rd, 2008 at 12:26 pm

    When are investors and developers going to realize that “search interface” is as good as it will every get in the context of a web browser and a keyboard. Stop wasting time there and put your efforts in the results, and relevancy of results.

    I’ve notice the last two years with google that too many high page rank sites showing up in results that are actually less helpfull to me than the lower page ranked sites would be.

    And when is techcrunch going to let me subscribe to replies for their blog posts? That would be one of my “top 10 web site features for 2007″….behind the times eh TechCrunch?

  49. Kevin Burton

    January 3rd, 2008 at 4:20 pm

    Interesting to say the least.

    Just blogged it:

    http://feedblog.org/2008/01/03/blekko/

    I think Rich is going to need a crawler with a lot more scale than http://spinn3r.com though. He’s going to need a web scale crawl which is NOT going to be cheap.

  50. markus941

    January 3rd, 2008 at 6:53 pm

    Was Blechbarf.com taken?

    Blekko?! Are you serious? These people must know squat about branding and word association. It sounds like something threw up - not a visceral feeling you want associated with search.

  51. Q

    January 5th, 2008 at 3:09 pm

    A tiny thing to look on: http://www.43n39e.ru/

  52. Talat

    January 23rd, 2008 at 8:29 pm

    I am sorry, but when I was in school I read that two Pakistani brothers working for IBM made the first computer virus. Or is it that Skrenta made the first “microcomputer” virus?

  53. Talat

    January 23rd, 2008 at 8:40 pm

    Sorry I mean two brothers working on IBM computers.

  54. Khurram

    January 25th, 2008 at 4:25 am

    Google is currently the king of search engine industry so I don’t think so that some one will be able to come near to it in near future

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