Microsoft is going to be announcing a new social search application very soon, possibly even Monday as it takes a shot at getting social with Windows Live, according to a recent Business Week article. The report hints at a few different new Microsoft search offerings. First, a search in the Question and Answer format which would rival the Google Answers and Yahoo Answers products. Second, a search that would follow a community search model. This model allows a community of users to tweak search result sets.
Eurekster, a two year old web 2.0 company, is mentioned in the article and currently has a community search product called Swicki which I have highlighted previously on Somewhat Frank and also worked with on several occasions (see left rail search tag cloud). It is unclear at this time if Microsoft is buying or partnering with Eurekster but I am sure we will find out soon enough. Either way I think it is great news for Eurekster.
Danny Sullivan, search engine guru, has a comprehensive article which explains his take on the recent report. Additionally, Pete Cashmore also sheds some web 2.0 light on the speculation.
