Aardvark (search engine)
Encyclopedia
Aardvark was a social search
service that connected users live with friends or friends-of-friends who were able to answer their questions, also known as a knowledge market
. Users submitted questions via the Aardvark website, email or instant messenger and Aardvark identified and facilitated a live chat or email conversation with one or more topic experts in the asker's extended social network. Aardvark would be used for asking subjective questions for which human judgment or recommendation was desired. It was also used extensively for technical support questions. Users could also review question and answer history and other settings on the Aardvark website. Google
acquired Aardvark for $50 million on February 11, 2010.
In September 2011, Google announced it would discontinue a number of its products, including Aardvark.
Users submit questions by email or IM. Aardvark guides the user through the question process by providing messages that confirm receipt of the question and explain any actions required by the user. IM users are also able to use a variety of "IM commands"--one word messages that can be used to fine-tune the question parameters, invite new users, or get help.
There are two main interaction flows available in Aardvark for answering a question. The primary flow involves Aardvark sending message to user (over IM, emails, etc.) asking if the user would like to answer a question. Periodically, Aardvark contacts users via email or IM when it believes they are the right person to answer another user's question. Aardvark searches through one's friends and their friends also. Instead of sending the question to every friend it finds, it will search through the person's profile to see if they have information related to the question.
When Aardvark sends a question to the user, if the user responds affirmatively, Aardvark relays the question as well as the name of the questioner. The user may then simply type an answer to the question, a friend's name or email address to refer to someone who may know the answer or simply type in "pass" to pass on this request. Aardvark send such requests for answers less than once a day to a given user (and users can easily change their contact settings, specify their preferred frequency and time of the day for such requests).
Aardvark currently supports Google Talk, Windows Live Messenger, AOL Instant Messenger and Yahoo Messenger.
A secondary flow of answering questions is more similar to traditional bulletin-board style interactions: a user sends a message to Aardvark or visits the "Answering" tab of Aarvark website, Aardvark shows the user a recent question from the user's network which has not yet been answered and which is related to the user's profile topics.This mode involves the user initiating the exchange when the user is in the mood to try to answer a question; as such, it has the benefit of tapping into users who act as eager potential answerers.
In all of the interfaces, wrappers around messages from another user include information about the user to facilitate trust: the user's real name, age, gender, the social connection between the two users, a section of topics the user has expertise in, and summary statistics of the user's activity on Aardvark.
Social search
Social search or a social search engine is a type of web search that takes into account the Social Graph of the person initiating the search query...
service that connected users live with friends or friends-of-friends who were able to answer their questions, also known as a knowledge market
Knowledge market
A knowledge market is a mechanism for distributing knowledge resources. There are two views on knowledge and how knowledge markets can function. One view uses a legal construct of intellectual property to make knowledge a typical scarce resource, so the traditional commodity market mechanism can be...
. Users submitted questions via the Aardvark website, email or instant messenger and Aardvark identified and facilitated a live chat or email conversation with one or more topic experts in the asker's extended social network. Aardvark would be used for asking subjective questions for which human judgment or recommendation was desired. It was also used extensively for technical support questions. Users could also review question and answer history and other settings on the Aardvark website. Google
Google
Google Inc. is an American multinational public corporation invested in Internet search, cloud computing, and advertising technologies. Google hosts and develops a number of Internet-based services and products, and generates profit primarily from advertising through its AdWords program...
acquired Aardvark for $50 million on February 11, 2010.
In September 2011, Google announced it would discontinue a number of its products, including Aardvark.
History
Aardvark was originally developed by The Mechanical Zoo, a San Francisco-based startup founded in 2007 by Max Ventilla, Damon Horowitz, Rob Spiro, and Nathan Stoll. A prototype version of Aardvark was launched in early 2008 with an alpha launch by October 2008. Aardvark was released to the public in March 2009, although initially new users had to be invited by existing users. The company has not released usage statistics.Interaction model
When a user joins Aardvark, Aardvark is added to the user's IM buddylist.Users submit questions by email or IM. Aardvark guides the user through the question process by providing messages that confirm receipt of the question and explain any actions required by the user. IM users are also able to use a variety of "IM commands"--one word messages that can be used to fine-tune the question parameters, invite new users, or get help.
There are two main interaction flows available in Aardvark for answering a question. The primary flow involves Aardvark sending message to user (over IM, emails, etc.) asking if the user would like to answer a question. Periodically, Aardvark contacts users via email or IM when it believes they are the right person to answer another user's question. Aardvark searches through one's friends and their friends also. Instead of sending the question to every friend it finds, it will search through the person's profile to see if they have information related to the question.
When Aardvark sends a question to the user, if the user responds affirmatively, Aardvark relays the question as well as the name of the questioner. The user may then simply type an answer to the question, a friend's name or email address to refer to someone who may know the answer or simply type in "pass" to pass on this request. Aardvark send such requests for answers less than once a day to a given user (and users can easily change their contact settings, specify their preferred frequency and time of the day for such requests).
Aardvark currently supports Google Talk, Windows Live Messenger, AOL Instant Messenger and Yahoo Messenger.
A secondary flow of answering questions is more similar to traditional bulletin-board style interactions: a user sends a message to Aardvark or visits the "Answering" tab of Aarvark website, Aardvark shows the user a recent question from the user's network which has not yet been answered and which is related to the user's profile topics.This mode involves the user initiating the exchange when the user is in the mood to try to answer a question; as such, it has the benefit of tapping into users who act as eager potential answerers.
In all of the interfaces, wrappers around messages from another user include information about the user to facilitate trust: the user's real name, age, gender, the social connection between the two users, a section of topics the user has expertise in, and summary statistics of the user's activity on Aardvark.