Just got my beta invite through for Searchme. Wow!

Rather than giving you the usual text-only results, Searchme shows a snapshot of the page it’s found – making it easier for you to tell if it matches your requirements.

Moving between the snapshots is akin to using Apple’s Coverflow, as found in iTunes and it’s OS X Leopard operating system. That is to say, a breeze.

Right now the database is relatively small; one billion pages as opposed to, say, Google’s 12 billion or so. But everybody has to start somewhere and the pages it stores will only grow over time.

The developers are swift to ensure we users know it’s a beta – and a real beta at that (not like GMail which has been in beta for 2 or 3 years and shows no signs of ever leaving).

I like the honesty: “our thing isn’t perfect, could you help us make it better please” is essentially what they’re saying. It means I’m helping to iron out the bugs, testing their web-based software against my own particular set-up and offering tips on how the next version can be even better.

Google has become the de facto search engine for most people and, as with Hoover, its name is in danger of passing from noun to verb. Whilst that might sound appealing, it has serious trademark issues – as any journalist who’s ever written Portakabin, Xerox or Kleenex when they meant “temporary, portable building”, “photocopy” or “tissue” will attest – but that doesn’t stop people doing it.

You say “I googled it”, not “I searched for it”. And when we say we ‘googled’ we don’t always mean we used Google. Or, at least, I don’t.

Is it even the best search engine any more? To answer that, we have to define ‘best’. Most results? Google probably wins on that score – but who wants to search through pages of chaff to find the one or two pages that are relevant to their precise needs.

Searchme may not be the best search engine yet – in terms of “finding the results I want for this particular search” – but their visual interface certainly makes their chances of succeeding, and toppling Google off its lofty perch, better than most