They don’t know it yet, of course. I’ve just checked the new alternative to Google, Cuil (pronounced “cool”) and found it amazingly accurate. They show me as the number 1 Richard Bennett and the number 1 Bennett. Very sweet, even though I’m only the number 12 Richard; that gives me something to strive for.
UPDATE: Esteemed BITS blogger Saul Hansell interviewed Cuil president Anna Patterson on her “36 hours of fame” and got an explanation of the site’s first day troubles: “We were overwhelmed with traffic that was not the standard pattern,†Ms. Paterson said. “People were looking for their names a lot.â€
Doh.
That was precisely the way I approached it, except they have a picture of some other dude, so net-negative viz me in this visual world, as I am far more handsome that him.
They had one of the Richard Bennetts pictured with a naked man which is a totally unrelated picture. On one of my articles, they pictured a few smiling Japanese ladies.
The search engine seems to only find people and not any other topic. I don’t think that’s a google killer, but the interface seems to be innovative.
I’m being sarcastic, Google is in no danger of being knocked off its pedestal by Cuil.