Twing, the Alternate Search Engine

Twing classifies itself as an alternate search engine and as it notes, only searches forums and forum discussions. Twing also notes that it "…aims to be the most comprehensive and highly targeted forum search engine for real people seeking real discussions and real information in real time." It will be interesting to see if it can truly bring into being what it suggests it can.

Twing, inside and out:

Not having a sufficient theory on just how Twing worked but interested enough to join and do an exploratory of my own I immediately navigated to the "How to use Twing" section. I was greatly surprised, or should I say dismayed, to find that other then the site navigation links the help section of Twing was blank.

As I browsed, unabated by the lack of what I perceived as a reckless creators design flaw, I soon discovered that Twing was so basic you do not need the standard help files. My first reaction had been to become frustrated, until I realized I did not really need the help files so there was no need to grumble about the lack of it.

Scott Germaise wrote: "…we're an alternative to… well… to the Big 5. (Google, Yahoo, Live, Ask and AOL.) And that's fine. We add other kinds of values beyond general web search. I suppose Extra Special search would be better."

"An alternative to the Big 5": those seemed like fighting words - that is until I comprehended that what Scott was really saying was Twing was in reality a specialized search engine whose sole purpose was to search forums. It was time for me to really put Twing to the test and forget my personal peeve(s).

I concluded that before signing back into my member account I needed to have a good look at the exterior because, as Twing points out, you do not have to be a member to use it. A first to my knowledge, which I found to be very commendable, an open door policy with no strings attached. Of course, if you desired to use some of the member only options you would need to join, but the choice is yours.

Hot Community Search Keywords:

Mother’s Day having just passed, and remembering my own mother who has passed away some years ago, this special day still brought back fond memories of her and so I decided to check the "Mothers Day Ideas" link just the same. I was not disappointed as I perused some well thought out requests for ideas and solutions.

Movie reviews was next and again I was not disappointed with the search selection as I scanned the results from Hollywood to Bollywood. Twing was definitely doing its job.

From Miley Cyrus, Meaning of Dreams and Obama to Baby Girl Names, Pope Benedict and High Gas Prices there was a wide variety of hot community search words/topics from which to choose. You also have the option to search your own desired topic by Posts, Topics or Forum.

The community hot topics not meeting your criteria or you just feel like browsing, the "Directory" is a good place to start. With 7,583 forums to choose from with such topics as Arts and Entertainment, Government, Law and Politics or Health and Medicine, Recreation and Hobbies and Technology and Engineering you're bound to find something to tweak your curiosity.

Preferences:

The next link that caught my eye and one I had missed prior was "Preferences". Here you have the option of defining the number of searches per topic (from 10 to 30) and in addition the ability to filter adult content and/or explicit language from your topic search. All of the latter options and without an account sounded pretty good!

Signed In:

It was finally time to sign in even though I have not touched on all the options available without joining. I could offer greater content detail but I need to save some surprises for you.

Once you become a member of Twing, you will have the ability to use the, "Special Members Only" options, such as participating in the Twing User Forum, Forum Owner/Administrator Forums and the ability to create your own favourites collection. (Just like setting bookmarks for your favorite Web pages, here you can create a collection of your favorite forums.) It just does not seem to get any better but then again what more would you want.

Actually, it can and does but I am going to make you search for yourself enabling you to appreciate Twing in your own right. A good place to start is here.

Conclusion:

I am going to eat a little crow here because initially my review was of the purely negative side. So much so that it took a good friend to open my eyes. Otherwise I would have lost out on all the good things about Twing I had failed to comprehend initially. It is easy to sit back and write a critique but to write an honest review you should try to put yourself in the position of the creator(s) to fully appreciate the efforts that went into a particular project. Then and only then can one start to truly deconstruct and write about the pros and cons that your readership and the program/site creators expect and deserve, be it good or bad.

Having contacted Twing support about the blank "How to Use Twing" page as noted in the beginning I received the following response. In all fairness, I would like to add their response in case you the reader find yourself experiencing the same problem with Twing.

"This may be a flash problem some folks experience with their browser cache. Please try going there again and try using Shift –> Refresh.

You may also want to try using a different browser (Firefox/Mozilla instead of IE, or vice versa.) Also, make sure you're able to run Flash on your browser, since that item is a Flash-based object."

So now I will definitely be adding Twing to my list of services though it took a re-write to open my eyes.