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Tech that's just wrong

By Rich Trenholm on 03 March 2008, 8:23am

Mahalo: People-powered Internet search
The arcane majesty of Google's search capabilities makes our ears weep if we think about it too hard. Its army of spider-bots is constantly scouring the entire Internet -- we like to think of them as actual tiny Matrix-style robots. When you type in a search term and hit enter, the results come back in a gobsmacking fraction of a second.

That's the point of computers. They do stuff that it is impossible for humans to do, in amounts of time that it would be impossible for humans to do it in. So what is the future for the Internet? According to Mahalo, it's bringing inefficient, slow-moving puny humans back into the equation. Mahalo founder Jason Calacanis claims that Google is too open to manipulation and mistakes, thanks to search engine optimisation, spam and general linkery-pokery. Instead, Mahalo allows people to manually create pages of useful links for each search term.

The concept of relevant links only is a good one, and Google isn't always bang on the money in that regard. But the fact remains Google's biggest strength is its speed and scope, while squishy humans are slow. Mahalo can't guarantee its links are up-to-date, and it can't do combinations of search terms. Get with the program, Mahalo; the future is less work for humans, not more.

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