Download Squad

The problem with search engines (if you're one of those people who believe there's a problem with search engines) is that they don't know who you are. Google and other search companies are tackling this issue by compiling your search history in a way that could eventually help the search engine decide which results will be most relevant. But for the most part, right now when you, your mother, and that mad scientist down the street search for information on building a nuclear bomb in your basement, you'll all get the same results.

Delver wants to change that. The company came out of stealth mode at this week's DEMO conference. The idea is that you can search for information that's relevant to you by gathering search results from your friends' social networking pages. All you have to do is enter your name into Delver's service (no registration necessary) and it will try to determine who you are, and then search your public profile on sites like Facebook, Flickr, and YouTube to determine who you friends are. Then when you enter a search term, like say "pizza places," you should get a list of places your friends recommend or at least have talked about.

If you do register for an account Delver will let you associate yourself with accounts on social networking sites. But as you've probably guessed, other users will be able to search your social network without knowing your password. Theoretically they can already do this, since all Delver does is draw publicly available information together in one place. But it's still mildly creepy. Then again, why would anyone care where your friends buy pizza?

[via TechCrunch]