• Tech Crunch, Thursday, April 12, 2007 10:45 AM

A new company called Spock takes a different approach to Web search, focusing on people, like a searchable encyclopedia, using a range of sources that goes far beyond social networks. According to TechCrunch, upward of 30% of Internet searches are people-related. And as anyone who's ever tried to look someone up on Google knows, people search could be better.

TechCrunch's Michael Arrington gave the site a test drive, and he reports that Spock did a great job finding information about bloggers, celebrities, journalists and other individuals with a Web presence. The best part about the search service, he says, is its ability to index and store information about a given person.

For example, for people with similar names, the search engine performs a "de-duping," after which that information is added to a permanent profile. Indeed, Spock is slowly indexing the entire Web, creating auto-tags for individuals based on the information they find. Tags for Bill Clinton include "former U.S. President, "Great Leader," "Womanizer," "Left Handed," "Democrat" and "Saxophonist," the report says. It also allows users to upload their own tags, and vote on whether existing tags are correct.

Spock isn't alone in the people-search market, although its technology is unique. Its startup competitors include Wink, ProfileLinker, ZoomInfo and UpScoop.

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