Cuil, pronounced cool, has been launched with much fanfare as a challenge to Google in search business. Cuil claims to be faster than Google and richer. It searches from 121617892992 (121.6 billion) web pages, three times that of Google. It claims to be smarter because it ranks and searches pages based on their content and not just their popularity, as Google does. This way it analyzes webpages and not those who visit them. Cuil promises to offer better search service to web users without compormising their privacy.
Privacy part does not bother me much–I grew up in a joint family in an old-fashioned house where courtyards and verahndah were big and rooms small–but user friendliness sure does. So, I decided to test cuil. I searched my own name. Search results couldn’t have been more gratifying for the (delusioned) Narcissisus in me. A search entry of “Avinash Kishore” returned 6870 results and 10 suggested categories for further exploration. The search categories were: Filmfare award winners, Indian Film Actors, Dadasaheb Phalke Awardees, Indian Songwriters, Indian Film Singers etc. etc.
Enthused, I tested it a few more times with similar results everytime. Cuil may think I am a film star but i am far from flattered. Cuil has access to 121 billion web pages and it is more respectful of my privacy. But I will continue to be loyal to Google: even if it is poor (only 40 billion pages indexed), voyeur (peeps into my web use habits), and assocites my name with only banal things.
