A9'S Opensearch RSS & Vertical Search

( Via Silcionvalleywatcher)

Jeff Bezos announced OSRSS,for Open Search RSS,a small set of extensions to RSS that enable vertical search. There can be very different set of results depending on which database you search. "If you search the Web for "Vioxx,"- you'll get the impression that Vioxx is about class action lawsuits. If you search the medical database PubMed you'll get very different results" - specific medical and pharmacological results. "PubMed actually does sophisticated translations from search term to specific medical terms." When a searchable database uses the OSRSS code to identify itself, it becomes essentially a "channel" to A9, and users can select which databases they want to see results from. OSRSS consists of three simple extensions to RSS that simply state total results, a starting index, and number of items per page. This is an important development indicating the maturity and the dawn of new generation search mechanisms a.k.a niche search engines.
We wrote sometime back, Search Evolution : Vertical, Horizontal, Niche!!,I see myself beginning to use niche search engines more and more(though all niche search engine usage put together could be substantially less than any one general search engine usage). For example services with discovery mechanisms powered by specialized algorithms like Findory or Topix shall always find a special place in the internet world where the volume of digital content is swelling by the day.The view expressed that"As advertising spending continues to swell in the search category, more and more marketers will diversify their "network" buys with small targeted placements on these specialized engines that potentially provide a better bang for the advertising buck" looks right.But the overall volume of business could be low but can provide with some significant stream of business. But Niche players need to provide more and more specialised offering and creating a new category of service that mainstream players may not be able to focus and provide - like Amex offering more than what traditional banks can offer -traveller's cheque convenience.