Expect Labs, which is a small startup in the San Francisco Bay Area, has a very impressive list of investors. Today the company announced a new funding round, though the figures weren't disclosed. Investors are the venture or investment arms of Intel, Samsung and Telefonica. Telefonica is the world's fourth largest telco and owns mobile operator O2 in the UK. Previous investors included Google, Greylock, Bessemer, IDG Ventures, KPG Ventures, Quest Venture Partners. The company has one product called MindMeld. It's sort of a (video) chat app but really more of a technology demonstration.  [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Google: Google Now | Search Engines: Experimental | Search Engines: Help Engines | Search Engines: Mobile Search Engines | Search Engines: Other Search Engines | Search Engines: Personalized Search Engines | Search Engines: Real Time Search

Twitter is working on a project that will give users access to an archive of all of their own tweets. Twitter CEO Dick Costolo told the New York Times this week that the company is building a tool that would let Twitter users download their own tweets. He didn't provide a timeframe for such a tool to be ready. Twitter search is notoriously shallow. Although the company has recently upgraded its search capabilities, the site's search box only shows results from the past seven days. With users tweeting more than 400 million times per day, a full-history, all-Twitter search/download to [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | Features: Analysis | Search Engines: Real Time Search | Top News | Topsy | Twitter: Search

Many U.S. Senators and Representatives are tweeting opinions, updates, images, documents, etc. these days, and Twitter can be a very useful, if not an essential tool, to learn about what’s going on directly from each member, especially regarding controversial legislation such as SOPA. An easy to use but powerful web tool (it's also free) named PolitickerUSA can save you a lot of time and effort informing you as to what members of congress are tweeting about right now. In one location you can quickly access the non-stop real-time stream of tweets from Senators, Reps, President Obama, go [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | How To: Twitter | Search Engines: People Search | Search Engines: Real Time Search | Twitter: Search

Waze is a somewhat unlikely success story. The social navigation and traffic app has just passed 7 million users globally and also announced another $30 million in funding, bringing its total to nearly $60 million. It also said that one of its new investors is Hong Kong magnate Li Ka Shing, who will help the company as it navigates (pardon the pun) the challenging and difficult Chinese market. The other investor in this round is Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. Mary Meeker joins the Waze board as a result. Waze has successfully created a community of engaged drivers with its crowdso [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | Search Engines: Buzz Search Engines | Search Engines: Location / Checkin Services | Search Engines: Maps & Local Search Engines | Search Engines: Mobile Search Engines | Search Engines: Real Time Search

Last Friday, Twitter quietly shutdown its "firehose" of tweet data that was being piped to Google. Like a gas station no longer getting deliveries, Google in turn effectively had to hang a "Closed" sign on its Google Realtime Search service. What happened, and what's next for those who depended on Google to get some of their Twitter gas? Some thoughts and advice, below. Topsy Provides Twitter Archive Search First, there's a great alternative to Google Realtime Search: Topsy. Indeed, the company has just put out a blog post reminding the world that it's the only Twitter archive search ser [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | Features: Analysis | Google: Google+ | Google: Real Time Search | Microsoft: Bing | Microsoft: Bing Social Search | Search Engines: Real Time Search | Top News | Topsy | Twitter: Search

Collecta, one of several search engines that aimed to make the growing amount of real-time data searchable, appears to have formally shut its doors. A message on Collecta's home page tells visitors, "The Collecta story will be updated shortly ... you caught us in transition." ReadWriteWeb reported earlier that Collecta plans to make its software open source and is already working with agencies such as the United Nations that could potentially use the software to help with crisis relief projects. Collecta launched about two years ago when real-time search was a hot topic. It offered a num [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Consumer | Search Engines: Real Time Search

Looking for images that are being shared and posted in realtime? That image search space has gotten more competitive, as Nachofoto reenters the field. Below, what it offers, along with general realtime image searching tips using other services like Topsy, Google Realtime Search and Twitter itself. I've used realtime search tools often, in order to see if people are tweeting and sharing images from news events, such as when the tsunami hit Crescent City. At times, they can provide a faster way to see images before news outlets themselves. Nachofoto Nachofoto launched in April 2010 but clos [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | Google: Real Time Search | How To: Twitter | Search Engines: Photo & Image Search | Search Engines: Real Time Search | Top News | Topsy | Twitter

Topsy has just launched a new search engine that surfaces hot videos that are being shared on Twitter. The company announced Topsy video search this afternoon via its Twitter account. The new video search functions similarly to Topsy's other search tools -- web (links), tweets and photos. Results appear to be ranked based on several factors, including how often, how recent, and who shares the video on Twitter. The left column offers a number of filtering and sorting options. Those search results are pretty good; I found a few Japan-related videos that I hadn't seen yet despite having [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Video | Search Engines: Real Time Search | Search Engines: Video Search Engines | Top News | Topsy

Depending on your viewpoint, Collecta has either shut down or hit the pause button while the company "takes a step back" and retools it's approach. I just got off the phone with Collecta CEO Gerry Campbell who was upbeat about his company's prospects and next steps. He was candid, however, that the market he and his team anticipated never materialized -- or at least not in the way they had hoped. "We had hoped to find ourselves in the mainstream of activity," said Campbell. Collecta's ambition was to be both a destination and power the real-time web; and the company built a substantial inf [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Consumer | Search Engines: Real Time Search

Topsy has launched what it's calling Social Modules: embeddable widgets that bring Twitter content to any website. Topsy isn't the first nor only way to do this -- Twitter itself offers several flavors of embeddable widgets -- but Topsy's version offers a few brand-friendly options that I haven't seen available elsewhere. Topsy's module-maker is similar to what Twitter offers (and others), but with a couple notable differences that businesses should appreciate: Tweets can be filtered by influence (see the middle check box in the image above; see Topsy's website to read how it deter [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | Search Engines: Real Time Search | Topsy

Last week's news that OneRiot had shuttered its search engine left something of a void in the real-time search space. Numerous developers and companies that had come to rely on OneRiot's API were suddenly out in the cold. Today, Topsy has announced that it's taking on OneRiot's former real-time search partners via the Topsy API, which already powers real-time search on many websites and applications. As part of the partnership, Topsy is also monetizing its search platform via OneRiot's ad network. "We are honored that OneRiot is partnering with Topsy to transition their organic real-time [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | Search Engines: Real Time Search | Topsy

OneRiot, one of the early entries in the real-time search space, has shut down its consumer-facing search engine that was previously available at OneRiot.com. The company has announced that it will instead focus completely on its advertising network. "Realtime search is still very important to us," writes OneRiot CEO Tobias Peggs. But he says the company will focus solely on its ad network, which already syndicates "millions" of paid search ads every day. Our advertising platform has taken off like a rocket – both in terms of network growth and the number of advertisers who are seeking [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Consumer | Search Engines: Real Time Search

Looking for old tweets? Look to Topsy. The service has just expanded to have what it claims to be the largest searchable collection of past tweets, over 5 billion of them, stretching back to at least May 2008. That makes it more comprehensive than Google's Twitter search or even Twitter's own Twitter Search. Topsy will be sharing the news itself later today, on its blog. Beyond being comprehensive, another nice thing about Topsy is the ability to restrict a search using special "operators" or commands -- such as "from" -- to find tweets from a particular user or the ability to see tweets wi [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | Search Engines: Real Time Search | Top News | Topsy | Twitter

With Google announcing new Google Buzz API features today, real-time search engine OneRiot has followed up by announcing the inclusion of Google Buzz data in its real-time search products. OneRiot says it's one of the first companies to get access to the Google Buzz "firehose" -- the full stream of all public activities on Buzz. OneRiot says it'll use the firehose data in three ways: To expand its Trending Topics Engine To improve its real-time search results (including the OneRiot API) To improve its RiotWise ad network OneRiot says it's using the Google Buzz firehose on a limi [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | Google: Buzz | Search Engines: Real Time Search

Topsy, the Twitter-focused real-time search engine, has launched a new tool aimed at helping users find the right people to follow called Topsy Expert Search. The blog post seems to suggest that this is a "labs" product, but there's a prominent link to Expert Search right from Topsy's home page. Either way, Expert Search seems like a tool that's not quite ready for prime-time. Consider, for example, an expert search for SEO: (click for larger version) No disrespect to the account holders who are listed for that query -- they very well may be SEO experts. But I think most readers [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | Search Engines: People Search | Search Engines: Real Time Search | Topsy | Twitter

There's a highly local element to real-time search, and Sency -- a real-time search engine that we've profiled before -- has taken a small step toward marrying trending content and location. Sency is now showing what it calls a "trends engine for popular places." The idea of trends usually revolves around topics, but Sency is instead focusing on places. The company's announcement says trending places are available in 24 cities, such as Seattle: The "now" column is exactly what it sounds like; the "lately" column is trending places over the past few days, Sency says. Each of the plac [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Consumer | Search Engines: Real Time Search

A battle appears to be brewing over the promise of monetizing Twitter and, more specifically, over the placement of ads on the Twitter platform. NOTE: See our follow-up post to this article, FAQ: Twitter’s New Rules On Third-Party Ads In a lengthy blog post today, Twitter's Chief Operating Officer, Dick Costolo, announced that the company will not allow third parties to place ads in the Twitter stream -- something that Twitter's own Promoted Tweets already does. It is critical that the core experience of real-time introductions and information is protected for the user and with an eye to [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEM | Search Ads: General | Search Engines: Real Time Search | Twitter

Want to see what people share on Facebook with the entire world -- perhaps without realizing it? There's a new site that makes this easy, Openbook. Look At The Embarrassing Updates! Last week, I explored the issue of how Facebook's own "Posts  By Everyone" search feature revealed people who might be sharing material they didn't intend for the entire world to see. I'd strongly encourage people to read it: Facebook’s "Posts By Everyone" Feature: Do People Realize They’re Sharing To The World? Openbook allows you to see the same thing without having to be in Facebook at all. When [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | Facebook | Features: Analysis | Google: Real Time Search | Microsoft: Bing | Search Engines: Real Time Search | Top News

Many marketers understand Twitter search is a powerful way to monitor brand mentions and reach out to customers. But I think few realize what a powerful platform it provides to reach out on non-branded generic mentions. To better illustrate this, let me introduce the "Anyone Know" Twitter search. Actually, I'll explain "Anyone Know" toward the end of this article. To provide the right context for it, I first need to cover the brand monitoring that's already so well known. Brand Monitoring On Twitter Comcast is the classic brand monitoring story, covered over and over again. Comcast wa [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | Features: General | Search Engines: Answer Search Engines | Search Engines: Help Engines | Search Engines: Real Time Search | Search Marketing: General | Top News | Twitter

As it turns a year old, OneRiot has removed the "beta" label from its real-time search engine, and simultaneously launched a new home page that focuses on trending topics. As you can see from the screenshot below, the site's home page now offers a more compelling glance at what's buzzing right now in the news. OneRiot says its new home page is powered by a "Trending Topics Engine," and offers an extremely detailed explanation of the technology behind it. Today we’re launching our new Trending Topics Engine. This leverages our patented PulseRank technology and realtime index of the [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Consumer | Search Engines: Real Time Search