Preparing to relaunch, Jelly wants to bring “humanity” back to search

There has always been a sense that a human could provide a more accurate or more nuanced answer than an index-based search engine. But none of the efforts to build a human-powered alternative have thus far succeeded.

Whether you want to call them “social search,” “help engines,” “Q&A sites,” “answer engines” or “advice engines,” there have been more than a dozen attempts over the past seven or eight years to improve upon the familiar Google experience and bring humans more directly into the mix. To name only a few: Yahoo Answers, Answers.com, Askville (Amazon), ChaCha, Facebook Questions, Keen, Rewarder, Quora and Vark.

Many are gone, though some still exist. Jelly, from Twitter Co-Founder Biz Stone, was among them. Announced as a “new way to search,” Jelly launched in 2014 and met largely the same fate as most of the others on the list. However, Jelly is coming back.

Photo credit: Andrea Joliet

In a blog post yesterday, Stone teased his session with Danny Sullivan today at SXSW about Jelly:

Jelly Industries, Inc writes code and builds technology. Five of our eight employees are top notch engineers. We are a tech startup. We’ve recently built a little AI, a unique routing algorithm, some natural language processing, and made use of so many other technologies. But Jelly doesn’t search the web. It finds you the person with the answer you need.

Jelly is the only search engine in the world with an attitude, an opinion, and the experience to back it up. Only Jelly can say you asked the wrong question, provide answers you didn’t think to ask, and deliver a thoughtful answer to your anonymous query. Jelly is humanity presented as software. Search as we know it now is 20 years old.

This sounds quite similar to statements made at the original launch of Jelly, but we’ll have to wait and see how the new app differs from the old. Some of that emerged from the session, where Stone explained things like:

• Jelly is designed to route questions to those it believes are experts or have strong knowledge in certain areas.
• The new version, which is in a closed beta, will open to the public slowly in the coming weeks on the web.
• By the end of April, it’s expected the mobile version will open to the public.
• There are no specifics on how to earn money off the service, but Stone said he expects a model will emerge.
• The system won’t show the names of those asking questions, to help reassure people about asking anything.

For more, here are some of the tweets from Sullivan’s interview of Stone:

If you built a search engine today, it would look drastically different #SXSW @biz #NextSearch

— Justin Freid (@Justin_Freid) March 14, 2016

"The 6 degrees of separation study has been redone and now it's 4 degrees. We all are so connected" #NextSearch #SXSW

— Shari Spooner (@Shari_Sabe) March 14, 2016

Version 1 of Jelly did not work because your identity was attached to your query #SXSW #NextSearch

— Justin Freid (@Justin_Freid) March 14, 2016

Imagine if Google search was a tweet; you wouldn't search for 99% of your questions @biz #NextSearch #SXSW2016

— Carmen Duarte (@Carmen_Duarte) March 14, 2016

New @jelly will integrate AI, algos and data science to help people find answers. Web search interface makes it intuitive. #NextSearch #SXSW

— Charo Henríquez (@charohenriquez) March 14, 2016

The search engine part of @jelly is just finding the right person for your query. @biz #nextsearch #sxsw

— Stephanie Salmon (stephaniesalmon.bsky.social) (@stephaniesalmon) March 14, 2016

"Rather than route your query to web pages you route them to the people who know the answer" #SXSW #NextSearch

— Shari Spooner (@Shari_Sabe) March 14, 2016

Jelly2.0 will use AI to float a query to whos been-there-done-that @biz #nextsearch

— Anthony Blow (@AnthonyGadgetX) March 14, 2016

For those who answer questions on @jelly they learn from each engagement. They will start routing you certain questions #NextSearch

— Justin Freid (@Justin_Freid) March 14, 2016

"Google indexes documents. This may sound a bit creepy, but WE INDEX PEOPLE” @biz #nextsearch #sxsw

— Tony Lai (@lai) March 14, 2016

.@biz says #nextsearch is all about #routing — getting your query to the right person #sxsw – like building a tag cloud around every person

— Tony Lai (@lai) March 14, 2016

Sounds like @Biz 's goal is to rank People w/ answers as Subject Matter Experts via algo @Jelly #NextSearch #SXSW cc: @dannysullivan

— Elisabeth Os (@elisabethos) March 14, 2016

Jelly2’s interface will look more like the search engines we know, making it easier to use. #NextSearch #SXSW

— Justin Freid (@Justin_Freid) March 14, 2016

https://t.co/t8EiHaVmrI lets you just ask away. No need to sign up. *sigh of relief* #NextSearch

— Digital Bounds (@DigitalBounds) March 14, 2016

.@jelly Also sounds comparable to @StackOverflow @StackExchange conceptually at least #nextsearch

— infinite ∞✨ (@thatmarklee) March 14, 2016

https://twitter.com/iamstevetay/status/709434729041297408

People love answering questions when they know the answer, and they love the credit they get. #NextSearch #SXSW

— Luch (@kpLUCH) March 14, 2016

"Ask not what @jelly can do for you, ask what you can do for @jelly" – @biz on crowdsourcing answers #NextSearch #SXSW

— Charo Henríquez (@charohenriquez) March 14, 2016

The value proposition for @jelly – "we're saving you time on the internet." – @biz #NextSearch #SXSW

— Luch (@kpLUCH) March 14, 2016

The answer on @jelly won't be there in 3 seconds. Maybe 15 minutes, so "go about your life and we'll ping you later", @biz #NextSearch #SXSW

— Charo Henríquez (@charohenriquez) March 14, 2016

https://twitter.com/iamstevetay/status/709437185775173636

Instead of measuring time on page @biz wants @jelly to measure time NOT looking for answers. Time saved metric #NextSearch #SXSW

— Charo Henríquez (@charohenriquez) March 14, 2016

Jelly, search for the laziness #NextSearch

— Tode (@todearaujo) March 14, 2016

.@jelly won't replace Google. Google's the bridge between the internet and the lost souls of the inter web. #NextSearch

— Digital Bounds (@DigitalBounds) March 14, 2016

"Google is the bridge between millions of lost souls & websites" but @Jelly is a search engine that connects humans @Biz #SXSW #nextsearch

— Elisabeth Os (@elisabethos) March 14, 2016

"The internet is broken without @google", says @biz. @jelly is different, like Siri and Alexa. Not better, different. #NextSearch #sxsw

— Charo Henríquez (@charohenriquez) March 14, 2016

https://twitter.com/IsaDiasF/status/709438659095736321

.@jelly is the only search engine in the world that has an attitude and can tell you you've asked the wrong question. – @biz #nextsearch

— Stephanie Salmon (stephaniesalmon.bsky.social) (@stephaniesalmon) March 14, 2016

'Everybody's talking about artificial intelligence. How about just intelligence.' @biz on #nextsearch

— Eamonn Carey (@eamonncarey) March 14, 2016

https://twitter.com/IsaDiasF/status/709440349823832064

@jelly will excel at a search like "what are the coolest jeans available in San Francisco" #subjectivesearch #NextSearch

— Chris Thurling (@ChrisThurling) March 14, 2016

"@jelly is like asking your neighbor: 'hey who helped you buy that house'" @biz #NextSearch #SXSW

— Shari Spooner (@Shari_Sabe) March 14, 2016

Not everyone has a brother in law that's a dentist & can help them w/ their tooth question. That is when @jelly steps in. #SXSW #NextSearch

— Shari Spooner (@Shari_Sabe) March 14, 2016

Google has become a habit for people, it will be hard to change that behavior #SXSW #NextSearch

— Shari Spooner (@Shari_Sabe) March 14, 2016

@jelly can become part of other application, e.g. ask Jelly via Twitter. Via Browser, Messenger? Interesting mechanic! #NextSearch #SXSW

— Rüdiger Maeßen (@rmaessen) March 14, 2016

Goal for @jelly would be to integrate with other tools like @twitter and @slackhq to answer questions. – @biz #nextsearch

— Stephanie Salmon (stephaniesalmon.bsky.social) (@stephaniesalmon) March 14, 2016

https://twitter.com/iamstevetay/status/709441533074808832

https://twitter.com/iamstevetay/status/709442041608933376

@biz tells @dannysullivan there'll be a bus. model 'at some point' for @askjelly. Prove value first. #bristolatSxSW pic.twitter.com/rObqMzJHQ8

— ☀️ Ryan Webb ☀️ (@ryanwebb) March 14, 2016

https://twitter.com/IsaDiasF/status/709442535970570240

Promoted answers by brands could be a thing / rev model @Jelly says @Biz to @dannysullivan #SXSW #nextsearch

— Elisabeth Os (@elisabethos) March 14, 2016

A "promoted answer" sounds interesting. Would brands then be able to come to the top when people need answers? #asksearch #SXSW #NextSearch

— Shari Spooner (@Shari_Sabe) March 14, 2016

https://twitter.com/AndreaJoliet/status/709446272596312065

"I am convinced my son is not going to type to computers, he is going to talk to computers" – @biz #NextSearch #SXSWInteractive

— Line Atallah (@LineAtallah) March 14, 2016

@biz tells the story of flash funding all 50 states via @DonorsChoose on his birthday #BestSchoolDay #sxsw #nextSearch

— Jessica Crabbe (@jessicaacrabbe) March 14, 2016

https://twitter.com/Devin_Walker/status/709447044146987009