A new search engine created by Ex-Googler called Topicle has been launched today. It was Steffen Mueller’s own idea, to launch a search engine community which business operating model is similar to Wikipedia that allowed users to create or edit the content, in this case, i.e. search results. Steffen Mueller, previously held as the Product Manager at Google, and played a part in the launching of Google Maps, Google Web Search and Froogle, believed in search engine should be performed better if the results are relied on human efforts rather than computer algorithms.

Topicle begins with the Internet users, i.e. you. Of course, in this sense you can say the value of Topicle is lies not so much in advanced and unique technology, but in the critical mass of the URLs the users submitted. In illustrate this, Topicle has provided an about page to show users how they can make Topicle a better search engine. First, a user can create her own search engine by enter the search engine name such as Best Recipe Sites, and below the column user can submit the URLs that she think is most suitably. Apparently, Topicle’s technology will check the URLs in order to qualifying the URLs as well as checking the invalid URLs, resulting the spam sites may not easily be shown on the Topicle search result pages. Besides, users can edit the URLs others submitted and they are allowed to vote each of the URLs in the scale from 1 to 5. Click on the link “URLs are waiting for your rating” will enable you to do the edition either “Skip this URL” or “Report Spam.” And thus, for the long term, Topicle has the potential to collect all the best yet hidden Web link in the search engine sector.

The deepened between Topicle and users tend to fill a gap that other search engines available on the Web by allowing users to keep control of the search results. Apparently, users are the clear winners, as all the URLs are handpicked by users, in spite of the back-end search engine are provided by Google Custom Search technology. However, the future success of Topicle depends on the contribution of users, will the users are more than happy to submit the URLs they like to Topicle still an unknown factor. Nevertheless, it will be really interesting to take a look at Topicle a few years from now, as more and more URLs are submitted by the users.

As of present, Topicle is the first Web product of Zoolium and is getting major publicity for the launched of this vertical search engine.

via [ReadWriteWeb]