What is Google’s response to the newly released Wolfram Alpha? Google Squared.
Google has now launched a live version of the new search tool, which was first debuted during the company’s Searchology event last month. Google Squared delivers users a different way to view search results by placing relevant information regarding the search query in tabular form like one would see on a spreadsheet.
Google Squared was designed to organize searches in a way which makes for easy comparison.
The company stated in its blog:
Google Squared is an experimental search tool that collects facts from the web and presents them in an organized collection, similar to a spreadsheet. If you search for -roller coasters-, Google Squared builds a square with rows for each of several specific roller coasters and columns for corresponding facts, such as image, height and maximum speed.
We did a few test searches and the one for "Australian prime ministers" was quite interesting. Apparently Kevin Rudd had been succeeded by Brendan Nelson -- clearly you can only use Google Squared as a very general guide at the moment.
The same search on Wolfram Alpha provided quite a different style of results:
The different style of results shows that the two search engines aren't directly comparable - they're setting out to do slightly different things. Wolfram Alpha tries to build an encyclopaedia page style result for you, while Google Squared tries to make more order out of search results. Both services try to sort through web pages and find facts for you though, rather than simply referring you to web pages to read yourself.
Google Squared would win over Wolfram, though, when comparing travel destinations, products, or the like, where information is often provided in a very structured format to begin with. You can check out Google Squared here.
One last screenshot for a laugh -- the search for "Australian newspapers" returned very odd results. Apparently the music that accompanies the newsroom at the Bayside Bulletin in Queensland is Pagan Musicians - Bardic Circle.
