AltaVista's image identification system operates essentially like that at Lycos. Images are associated with words that appear in their ALT text, file names and on the page. A search looks for matches in this text, not within the images. Monier added that some more sophisticated things are also being done beyond this basic operation, but he declined to provide more details. One sophisticated thing that AltaVista does offer beyond Lycos is the ability to do a true image search independent of text association.
Users can ask to see more pictures that are visually similar to any picture selected.
A link to Searchopolis, mentioned in the article, can be found here. The Lycos multimedia search service. It features 40,000 images organized by category, from the PicturesNow catalog. You can browse categories and view thumbnails of these pictures. Search mode lets you scan the web for pictures or sounds of interest, but no thumbnails are provided.