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Technorati



 
 
Technorati is an Internet
Internet

The Internet is a global network of interconnected computers, enabling users to share information along multiple channels. Typically, a computer that connects to the Internet can access information from a vast array of available server and other computers by moving information from them to the computer's local memory....
 search engine
Search engine

A search engine is an information retrieval designed to help find information stored on a computer system. The search results are usually presented in a list and are commonly called hits....
 for searching blog
Blog

A blog is a type of website, usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video....
s, competing with Google
Google

Google Inc. is an United States public company, earning revenue from AdWords related to its Google search, Gmail, Google Maps, Google Apps, Orkut, and YouTube services as well as selling advertising-free versions of the Google Search Appliance....
 and Yahoo. As of June 2008, Technorati index
Web indexing

Web indexing includes back-of-book-style Index to individual websites or an intranet, and the creation of keyword Metadata to provide a more useful vocabulary for Internet or onsite search engines....
es 112.8 million blogs and over 250 million pieces of tagged social media. The name Technorati is a portmanteau, pointing to the technological
Technology

Technology is a broad concept that deals with an animal species' usage and knowledge of tools and crafts, and how it affects an animal species' ability to control and adapt to its Natural environment....
 version of literati
Literati

Literati may refer to:*Intellectuals*The scholar-bureaucrats or literati of imperial China**Literati painting, also known as the Southern School of painting, developed by Chinese literati...
, or intellectuals.

Technorati was founded by Dave Sifry
Dave Sifry

Dave Sifry is an United States software entrepreneur and blogosphere icon known most recently for founding Technorati, a leading blog search engine....
 and its headquarters
Headquarters

Headquarters denotes the location where most, if not all, of the important functions of an organization are concentrated. The corporate headquarters is the entity at the top of a corporation taking full responsibility managing all business activities....
 are in San Francisco
San Francisco, California

The City and County of San Francisco is the fourth most populous city in California and the List of United States cities by population in the United States, with a 2007 estimated population of 799,183....
, California
California

California is a U.S. state on the West Coast of the United States of the United States, along the Pacific Ocean. It is bordered by Oregon to the north, Nevada to the east, Arizona to the southeast, and to the south the Mexico state of Baja California....
, USA
United States

The United States of America is a Federal government constitutional republic comprising U.S. state and a federal district. The country is situated mostly in central North America, where its Contiguous United States and Washington, D.C., the Capital districts and territories, lie between the Pacific Ocean and Atlantic Oceans, Borders of the U...
. Tantek Çelik
Tantek Çelik

Tantek ?elik, of San Francisco, is a computer scientist of Turkey-United States of America descent and was the Chief Technologist at Technorati.....
 was the site's Chief Technologist.

Technorati uses and contributes to open source
Open source

Open source is an approach to design, development, and distribution offering practical accessibility to a product's source . Some consider open source as one of various possible design approaches, while others consider it a critical Strategy element of their business operations....
 software.






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Encyclopedia


Technorati is an Internet
Internet

The Internet is a global network of interconnected computers, enabling users to share information along multiple channels. Typically, a computer that connects to the Internet can access information from a vast array of available server and other computers by moving information from them to the computer's local memory....
 search engine
Search engine

A search engine is an information retrieval designed to help find information stored on a computer system. The search results are usually presented in a list and are commonly called hits....
 for searching blog
Blog

A blog is a type of website, usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video....
s, competing with Google
Google

Google Inc. is an United States public company, earning revenue from AdWords related to its Google search, Gmail, Google Maps, Google Apps, Orkut, and YouTube services as well as selling advertising-free versions of the Google Search Appliance....
 and Yahoo. As of June 2008, Technorati index
Web indexing

Web indexing includes back-of-book-style Index to individual websites or an intranet, and the creation of keyword Metadata to provide a more useful vocabulary for Internet or onsite search engines....
es 112.8 million blogs and over 250 million pieces of tagged social media. The name Technorati is a portmanteau, pointing to the technological
Technology

Technology is a broad concept that deals with an animal species' usage and knowledge of tools and crafts, and how it affects an animal species' ability to control and adapt to its Natural environment....
 version of literati
Literati

Literati may refer to:*Intellectuals*The scholar-bureaucrats or literati of imperial China**Literati painting, also known as the Southern School of painting, developed by Chinese literati...
, or intellectuals.

Technorati was founded by Dave Sifry
Dave Sifry

Dave Sifry is an United States software entrepreneur and blogosphere icon known most recently for founding Technorati, a leading blog search engine....
 and its headquarters
Headquarters

Headquarters denotes the location where most, if not all, of the important functions of an organization are concentrated. The corporate headquarters is the entity at the top of a corporation taking full responsibility managing all business activities....
 are in San Francisco
San Francisco, California

The City and County of San Francisco is the fourth most populous city in California and the List of United States cities by population in the United States, with a 2007 estimated population of 799,183....
, California
California

California is a U.S. state on the West Coast of the United States of the United States, along the Pacific Ocean. It is bordered by Oregon to the north, Nevada to the east, Arizona to the southeast, and to the south the Mexico state of Baja California....
, USA
United States

The United States of America is a Federal government constitutional republic comprising U.S. state and a federal district. The country is situated mostly in central North America, where its Contiguous United States and Washington, D.C., the Capital districts and territories, lie between the Pacific Ocean and Atlantic Oceans, Borders of the U...
. Tantek Çelik
Tantek Çelik

Tantek ?elik, of San Francisco, is a computer scientist of Turkey-United States of America descent and was the Chief Technologist at Technorati.....
 was the site's Chief Technologist.

Technorati uses and contributes to open source
Open source

Open source is an approach to design, development, and distribution offering practical accessibility to a product's source . Some consider open source as one of various possible design approaches, while others consider it a critical Strategy element of their business operations....
 software. Technorati has an active software developer
Software developer

A software developer is a person or organization concerned with facets of the software development process wider than design and coding, a somewhat broader scope of computer programming or a specialty of project manager including some aspects of Software product management....
 community, many of them from open-source culture. Sifry is a major open-source advocate, and was a founder of LinuxCare and later of Wi-Fi
Wi-Fi

Wi-Fi is a trademark of the Wi-Fi Alliance, founded in 1999 as Wireless Internet Compatibility Alliance , comprising more than 300 companies, whose products are certified by the Wi-Fi Alliance, based on the IEEE 802.11 standards ....
 access point software developer Sputnik. Technorati includes a public developer's wiki
Wiki

A wiki is a page or collection of Web pages designed to enable anyone who accesses it to contribute or modify content , using a simplified markup language....
, where developers and contributors collaborate, as well as various open APIs.

The site won the SXSW 2006 awards for Best Technical Achievement and also Best of Show. It was also nominated for a 2006 Webby
Webby

Webby may refer to:*Webby Awards*Webby Vanderquack*Webby Mobile*Mariama Elaiza Webby...
 award for Best Practices, but lost to Flickr
Flickr

Flickr is an and video hosting service website, web services suite, and online community platform. In addition to being a popular Web site for users to share personal photographs, the service is widely used by bloggers as a photo repository....
 and Google Maps
Google Maps

Google Maps is a free web mapping service application and technology provided by Google that powers many map-based services including the Google Maps website, #Google Ride Finder, Google Transit and embedded maps on third-party websites via the Google Maps Application programming interface....
.

Technology

Technorati looks at tags
Tag (metadata)

A tag is a non-hierarchical index term assigned to a piece of information . This kind of metadata helps describe an item and allows it to be found again by browsing or searching....
 that authors have placed on their websites. These tags help categorize search results, with recent results coming first.

Criticism


In February 2006, Debi Jones pointed out that Technorati's "State of the Blogosphere" postings, which claimed that they track 27.7 million blogs, failed to take into account MySpace
MySpace

MySpace is a social network service website with an interactive, user-submitted network of friends, personal profiles, blogs, groups, photos, music, and videos for teenagers and adults internationally....
 blogs, of which she says there are 56 million. As a result, she says the utility of Technorati as a gauge for blog popularity is questionable. However by March 2006, Aaron Brazell pointed out that Technorati had started tracking MySpace blogs.

In May 2006 Technorati teamed up with the PR agency Edelman
Edelman (firm)

Edelman is an independently owned public relations company founded in 1952 by Daniel J. Edelman and today led by President & CEO Richard Edelman....
. The deal earned a lot of criticism, both on principle and as a result of Edelman's 2006 fake blog
Fake blog

A fake blog is an electronic communication form that appears to originate from a credible, non-biased source, but which in fact is created by a company or organization for the purpose of marketing a product, service, or political viewpoint....
 scandals. Edelman and Technorati officially ended the deal in December 2006. That month, Oliver Reichenstein pointed out that the so called "State of the Blogosphere" was more of a PR-tool and money maker for Edelman and Technorati than a reliable source, explaining in particular a) why Technorati/Edelman's claim that "31% of the blogs are written in Japanese" was "bogus" and b) where the financial profit for the involved parties was in this.

In May 2007, Andrew Orlowski
Andrew Orlowski

Andrew Orlowski is a United Kingdom columnist for the online IT newspaper The Register....
 writing for the tech tabloid
Tech Tabloid

A Tech tabloid is a type of news media that mainly concentrates on technology news: science, IT, semiconductors, telecoms and related issues, but also takes on a less formal and more humorous approach than traditional technology publications such as EE Times or EDN ....
 The Register
The Register

The Register is a United Kingdom technology news and opinion website. It was founded by John Lettice and Mike Magee in 1994 as a newsletter called "Chip Connection", initially as an email service....
 criticized Technorati's May 2007 redesign. He suggests that Technorati has decided to focus more on returning image thumbnails rather than blog results. He also claims that Technorati never quite worked correctly in the past and that the alleged refocus is "a tacit admission that it's given up on its original mission".

External links

  • official page, reference for much of the above