I don’t think it’ll be any surprise by now that Google’s ruling the Search space. And they’re ruling it because they deliver an amazingly quick and effective service - for free - and are more than happy to share it with the world, competitors, and third-party app developers.

That being said, there are a number of people who somehow feel that Google’s reign is unfair - that they capitalized Search at the dawn of the era (much like Microsoft did with the PC), and created an unshakable monopoly that has, so far, stood the test of time. I don’t think Microsoft did nearly as well.

It might be jealousy (professional or not), but people are trying to dethrone Google. And none made us think it would come closer than Cuil made us think it could come close to dethroning Google.

Cuil, wtf? “Cuil” (pronounced “Cool”, which is a severe massacre of the name) is a new kind of search engine that’s supposed to be lighter and faster than Google (which doesn’t account for the pre-neanderthal indexing tactics employed by Twiceler), and is supposed to offer a more enjoyable searching experience.

Whether or not the inadvertent pornography was meant to enhance the effect, Cuil is actually a terrible experience altogether. The problems are numerous, and I’ll damn well list them all.

Irrelevant results.
This was the main sticking point for a lot of people. Indexing the Internet is fine. Indexing a dead mass of pages that have seen less traffic than the Trans-Atlantic bypass (there isn’t one) isn’t fine. People don’t just want comprehensive results - they want recent and relevant results, too.

Images.
The most confusing thing since Rubik and his damned cube are the images alongside the search results. They’re apparently gathered and displayed by means of a highly complex and intricate indexing algorithm (code for “we don’t know how it works, but we stole it from Google, so it works nonetheless“). Apart from being annoying, they’re great magnets for complanatory emails involving copyright infringement.

Interface.
Google took over the Search world because of their clean interface. Query, Search, Results in a row. With Cuil, it’s Open, Find The Search Box, Query, Enter, Wonder What The F*ck is Going On. Cuil takes the initiative to present your Irrelevant Results in a “Magazine format” (code for “we couldn’t find a better way to spend our money”), along with them Images.

Index.
Cuil has indexed over 120 billion pages of irrelevant rubbish. I mean, if they wanted to build a dumpster diver, then sure, Cuil’s doing an admirable job. As a search engine, however, they’re evidently looking in all the wrong places. Maybe Twiceler did a great job of overloading and crashing the servers with the relevant results before indexing them? It would sure explain a lot.

All in all, it was an incredible waste of time, money, and hype. Maybe talent, too, since they apparently dragged some of Google’s brightest into the Cuil team. I’m guessing those muffins were something special…