Like others, I was pretty excited to try out the new Cuil.com search engine. And like others, the first thing I googled, err, cuiled, was myself.
http://www.cuil.com/search?q=walker%20fenton&pi=0&sl=long
Page 1 was pretty accurate, a recent interview with Blogtalk radio and my twitter account showed up, followed by some random mentions. But starting on about page 3 I found the results got really interesting. For some reason, Cuil likes to attach 'relevant' images to results that may or may not have anything to do with the content. Take a look at this one:
Nice photo, but it isn't me. Nor is it the author of the post. The result links through to a press release on market wire. Interesting. A little further along I found this guy:
He's attached to a press release that I was quoted in for Rally Software circa 2004. Huh? Perhaps he works at Rally?
Here's the answer from cuil.com - faq #7
7. You have images beside your results. How do you pick which pictures to use?
We know from our research that people can make better and quicker decisions about relevance and quality when they can see an image from the website. We do our best to take images from Web pages that accurately reflect the content of the website. Many websites are full of images, so we use advanced algorithms to determine the best image to show the user.
In print I agree with that, I can make 'better and quicker' decisions when I see an image. But so much rides on that image... I found unknown guy #1 again next to a result that pointed to Jeremiah Owyang's blog. Again, I don't know this guy, and he's not Jeremiah. So why is he showing up in my search results?
I think Cuil should back off the photos until they are more accurate.
