November 19, 2004
Now, For Something a Little Different
Amazon recently released its own search engine, named A9, to the public. (yep I sure would like to have been able to bill for thinking up that name....someone expended some serious brain cells there-can we say fear of creativity? And what's with the mysterious number-name web site fad? At least 43 things is fun-kinda:)
I started using A9 sometime in mid September.If you log and identify yourself to A9, it provides some interesting user features. The most interesting thing A9 does is maintain a complete history of all the sites you visit, excluding secure sites. I don't particularly recommend A9-using the search engine does give you a minuscule rebate on Amazon but they are candid in their privacy policy about the fact that they are free to use any information they get about you when you surf with their tool on AND that they have the right to share this information in whatever manner they choose.
However, I was totally amazed to see that on the average, over the last 2.5 months, I visited 8,800 pages a month, A9's history counts each individual visit to a page. The daily average of about 293 doesn't sound as unreasonable. I do a lot of web development so I click back and forth testing pages. Still it made me try to remember exactly when was the last time I went outside.
Without delving into the philosophy of the database of intentions, I think that over time it would be interesting to track my browsing history and search history, but not for Amazon's benefit. I still remember the first time I 'surfed the web', sometime in 1995. You never forget your first time.
So I just added another 30 or so pages to my surfing history, trying to find a tool that DOESN'T erase browsing history. I once had a program that drew a graphical map of my surfing activity but I lost it years and years ago. Haven't found one yet, will report back when I re-surf-ace.
Posted by Trigger Tech at November 19, 2004 1:31 AM Permalink
