Wikia Search was a free and open-source Web search engine and a part of Wikia (originally Wikicities) operated by Wikia, Inc., a for-profit company founded in late 2004 by Jimmy Wales and Angela Beesley. The "public alpha" was launched on January 7, 2008. The roll-out version of the search interface was widely criticized by reviewers in mainstream media.

On June 3, 2008, an upgraded version of Wikia Search was released with additional features such as improved screen display and facilities for users to rate, edit and enhance the search results. In particular, it offered users the possibility of adding pertinent URLs to the results displayed and deleting any misleading results with immediate effect. The improvements were widely welcomed by a number of former critics.

By August 2008, Wikia Search held a 0.000079% share of the search market in the U.S., compared with Google's 70.77%. Google is also conducting experiments with page ranking based on user feedback, but Jimmy Wales responded that Google's random tests and a closed algorithm are different from the open community-oriented, so called crowdsourcing, attempts of Wikia Search.

The site was said to be going down after March 31, 2009; however, as of April 16, 2009, the site was running, but with "So long and thanks for all the fish! Have a specific question? Try wikianswers!" near the bottom of the page. Finally on May 14, 2009, the search engine service was brought to a halt. Queries to the Wikia Search URL: http://search.wikia.com/ were redirected, with a message in part stating "The Wikia Search project has ended."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikia_Search

Made by : Kevin M (11 IPA 2)