Late last month Google announced that its searches encompass more Web pages than any other search engine - averaging more than 1 billion. That includes 560 million full-text indexed pages and 500 million partially indexed pages. By contrast, Inktomi's database includes 500 million pages, double those of AltaVista and Excite. They've won numerous awards. We've had users asking us about them and we looked into it and they really have a good search relevance.
Relevance is the operative term.
In addition to prowling directories assembled by humans, most searches hunt for Web keywords without checking whether they're relevant to the search. In an attempt to measure relevancy, Google analyzes sites that link to pages containing the keywords and examines how prominent the keywords are on the pages. Google's link analysis and simple user interface have been emulated by AltaVista and ExciteAtHome, among others. The next new search star could already be on the horizon. Direct Hit superseded Inktomi as HotBot's main search provider in 1998.