If you have never used it, Wolfram|Alpha is a “computational knowledge engine” which equates to an online ‘computer’ of sorts, using a vast archive of information to generate facts and figures about most things. Though not a ’search’ engine as such, it represents an interesting resource to be utilised in research. It is the product of Wolfram Research (read more about them at Wikipedia here) and the man behind it, Stephen Wolfram.

For instance, did you know that the average age of an internet user is approximately 27.5 years and there are about 1.393 billion internet users in the world, with the USA having 223 million of those - about 16%, so now you know where to target those ads!

More interesting facts - Google.com apparently gets 480 million visits a day (or 5556 visits per second), Yahoo! 370 million whilst Bing gets only 160 million. Google itself has market capital of $158 billion whilst Coca-Cola falls behind, with $122.5 billion and Yahoo! a mere $23.66 billion.

So, if you are looking for numbers for anything, a presentation, research, or just trying to kill, some time check out Wolfram|Alpha here and see what it can dig up from the world wide web for you.

And of course, for people that enjoy them, a ‘mash-up’ exists. Goofram combines results from Google and Wolfram|Alpha side by side on one page. Though inputs into Google will always give results, Wolfram|Alpha can only compute certain words or phrases, therefore sometimes you will draw a blank, but in many cases you get two, very contrasting sets of results, on the same topic. Check out Goofram here.

Microsoft recently re-branded their search platform as Bing, originally codenamed ‘Kumo’. What was Live Search is now Bing and there is a lot to be said for the effort Microsoft has put into its ‘new’ search platform.
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Vinny Lingham (read his personal blog here), the founder of Clicks2Customers, started a company called Synthasite after leaving Clicks2Customers operationally. If you don’t know, Synthasite is an innovative initiative in Web 2.0. Synthasite gives anyone with the minimum of design skills, the ability to create their own website or blog for free. It’s easy to […]

Google recently (and quietly) introduced a new match type in it’s Search query Match Type Report that gives advertisers a bit more insight into a user’s search behavior. For a long time Google has been personalizing the adverts shown to a user based on the other (previous) searchers that user made during a session. Although […]

I’d like to talk about the conversion funnel.
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When Google launched Chrome last week, I noticed a download link on its homepage. I didn’t think too much of it and assumed it was a launch stunt. But more than a week later, the link still occasionally appears. Given Google’s resistance to putting a privacy link on its home page, I wonder why they […]

When the gorilla in the room develops a new web browser, you cant help but pay attention. That Google was working on a browser was not really a secret, they already hired a lead developer from Firefox nearly 3 years ago. Nevertheless the entry of Google into this market is bound to ruffle a few […]

When Google introduced the concept of a minimum bid into the Adwords platform, I guess few advertisers and perhaps not even Google realized the effect it would have on their business.
Publicly, Google always maintains that relevance and user experience take priority over revenue generation and so the minimum bid was introduced to ensure that search […]