Powerset Releases Powerlabs

We got some great news from Powerset today, that the much awaited “natural search” engine will be operating Powerlabs to get feedback and inform the Internet community. Co-founder Steve Newcomb provided us with the first look inside their Powerlabs program, which will be an ongoing feedback and information portal. Steve sent us a couple of exclusive screenshots revealing the Powerlabs interface and a search result (only the second ever seen outside Powerset’s doors). Powerlabs looks like it will be the ultimate portal for true user feedback into one of the most technologically advanced startups this year. Very cool!

Powerset Revisited

Powerset is one of the most anticipated startups of 2007, but there is still very little known about the inner workings of the company or where their development is now. Powerset received $12.5 million in funding back in November of 2006 and we covered Powerset on a number of occasions after their launch. CEO Barney Pell, COO Steve Newcomb and Product Architect Lorenzo Thione founded the innovative company with the vision of overtaking Google as the premier search engine on the Web. We hope everyone gets in on the labs and contributes to the development of something very Web 2.0.

Powerset’s innovation is intended to utilize breakthrough technologies to provide more intuitive searches with natural language queries. The vision is not unlike that of Hakia, Wikia-Search and a few others. However, the technology is rather drastically different though some elements may be similar. In my conversations with Riza Berkan it became evident that the people and technology of these companies parallel in many respects. I believe I have mentioned possible collaborations on more than one occasion. I hope to be able to clarify some of the similarities and differences once the Powerlabbers, as Steve calls the first group, gather information and input feedback into the system there.   

Powerlabs

I mentioned this aspect has been established to inform the Web 2.0 community and get valuable feedback during the upcoming stages of the engine’s development. The people at Powerset are another example of doing things “the right way” in the words of Riza Berkan, CEO of Hakia. The most excellent companies out there all follow the same meticulous path toward excellence and success. I have no doubt that what Powerset comes up with will be scientific art of the highest order. With the Powerlabs program a very few initial testers will supply input to Powerset and relate information to the community at large. The numbers of Powerlabs participants will obviously increase as the elements are developed.

First Look

The big news today is that we can bring you a front row seat for viewing Powerset innovation as it happens. Mark Johnson, Powerlabs Product Manager mailed me today with these screens and Steve promised weekly updates for readers interested in Powerset developments and activities. So we are happy to show you the very first look inside Powerlabs. Our readers can sign up for Powerlabs here plus see a video sneak peek here.

Note: The Powerlabs interface is much different from the actual search engine UI which will be typical of a search engine like Hakia etc.

Fig. 1 A screenshot of the Powerlabs interface.

Fig. 2 Powerset query result