Google Vs. Links2Go (was Re:Shameless Plug) (Score 1)

There is some similarity between the way Google uses link popularity to weight links and the way Links2Go uses link popularity to weight links. However, there is also similarity between the way Google uses link popularity and the way Inktomi, Excite, FAST, Go, and Northern Lights uses link popularity. In fact, all the major search engines use link popularity to rank search results [Search Engine Watch].

The difference between Links2Go and Google is that Links2Go learns a topical directory of links from an analysis of web pages. See, for example, links and topics related to Linux. Links2Go chose these topics and links because web page authors as a whole tended to use those topics and links to organize information on the web (not because a single human somewhere decided that they were the most interesting links).

This allows Links2Go to organize links by topic, allows users to navigate the topic hierarchy (topic "drill down") as they would with one of the hand-created directories, and bias keyword search based on topics and links related to the search terms. These are all features that are lacking in Google, because Google has no taxonomy of topics or method for classifying links by topic.

I like Google and use it all the time when I'm looking for specific information. But, when I want to research a topic in general and explore links related to a topic, I use Links2Go.