A couple of weeks ago I chatted with Giovanni Galluci one the awesome people who works on Viewzi, my favorite visual search engine. I played around with this one day, and instantly fell in love. I’ve been an unoffical evangelist ever since.
As the amount of information available on the web continues to increase exponentially in both size AND type (Mp3, videos, recipes, books, newspaper articles, etc) it’s only natural that the way we search evolves to compensate. Personally, I know how frustrating it can be to be looking for a specific type of information and have to wade through lists of Google results in order to get to it.
The Texas start-up is looking to fill that need by providing “views” or “filters” that can dramatically change the type of results as well as how they are presented.
But seeing is believing so let’s take a generic term say, Britney Spears, and see how what we can do with Viewzi. I’m only going to showcase a small sample of some Viewzi’s views, they have so many great ones, that it’s definitely worth exploring on your own.
After typing in the search word, I am taken to the “View Mix Page” that let’s me pick the view that will yield them most relevant results to me.
Now watch how the results change based on the view that I pick. Note that I can seamlessly shift between views without having to re-enter the search word.
Celebrity Photo View:
This view scans celebrity sites like JustJared.com and shows you a selection of photographs.
Web Screen Shot View
This view let’s you scroll through images of websites that contain your search word, in the same way that you would browse album covers in iTunes.
Album view
let’s you visually see all of album covers in one place.There is a link that pops up when you hover your mouse over a cover giving you the option to buy it. It also provides a list of related artists, in case you’re in the mood to discover new music.
Mp3 view
This lets yor search specifically for Mp3 files, and you can play them right from the search results page. Very handy if you’re trying to find a particular song.
x3 Video View:
Searches YouTube, Vimeo and Blinxx to get any videos tagged with the search term.
The 3d picture tagcloud
This view is one my favorites, it searches photo sites and let’s you visually see photos that relate to your tag term. You can move the cloud around and add or edit additional tags to your search. Sexy!
All of that data versatility in one place. Viewzi has an impressive list of views that also tackle recipes, weather, books and movies.
I like it because it makes search fun, interactive and visual. It’s a lot more interesting then just a list.
Try it out, and let me know what you think.
