Kevin Rose dugg us!! http://www.digg.com/tech_news/Mahalo_We_re_here_to_help
Today my team launched our latest project Mahalo.com. It's a human-powered search engine. We've already completed the top 4,000 search terms on the Internet and we hope to do 10,000 by the end of the year.

Our Mission: To help people.... a lot.

Please take a look at our results and compare the ones we have side by side with machine powered search by folks like Google, Ask, Yahoo, Technorati, AOL, and MSN. I think you'll find that humans can really help make search results better.

Feedback is not only welcome, I'm begging you for it! That's the whole point of our ALPAH: Tell us how to make search suck less! We're listening and we want to help... in fact, our tag line is "We're here to help!" The comments below are open so have at it, or post your thought to your own blog and I'll link to your comments (keep them constructive of course).

Here's the press release for today's launch, which took place at the Wall Street Journal's D Conference (thank Kara and Walt for including me in such an amazing event!). It also has details of our funding including our lead investors Sequoia Capital, Elon Musk, and Newscorp.

You'll probably be able to find some more feedback on the Mahalo project at these links over the next two days:

Google Blog Search
Technorati Blog Search
TechMeme
Google News
and at http://www.mahalo.com/mahalo_press_coverage

If you're with the media, a blogger, or podcaster and would like to schedule an interview please feel free to email media at mahalo dot com.

Great story in the WSJ about the buzz being generated by the top users at digg, Reddit, Newsvine, delicious, stumbleupon, and of course Netscape. The article really shows how the top users in these systems have become more than just "users," and the WSJ seems to really get that folks can be paid to do a job and not be corrupted.

Of course, when you pay people to do an editorial job you have setup a system for them to do so without compromising their ethics. We did this at Netscape by letting the Navigators blog/bookmark things they selected (i.e. unlike PayPerPost we didn't tell people what to blog about--let alone tell them it had to a be a positive result).

AOL is really doing a great job of supporting Netscape from what I can see. They haven't cut the budget, and it seems that the tech roadmap that we setup when I was there is being executed on brilliantly (it really is an amazing tech team over there!). The Netscape 9 browsers is ground breaking no many levels, and the stats from Netscape six months in are *exactly* like digg's after six months (250,000 stories and 150,000 members @ Netscape--not to shabby!).

AOL is sitting on a powerhouse with Netscape and I hope the give it a full two year runway because that's what it takes to build a community system like this. Netscape is the #1 or #2 social news system in the world and AOL owns 100% of it--that's big. CondeNast owns the #3 system with Reddit, and digg is probably gonna get snapped up by Yahoo, Google, or Newscorp I'm sure. So, AOL got essentially a free foothold in this emerging space because Jon Miller, Ted Leonsis, and Jim Bankoff made a long-term bet that is *just* starting to pay off.

I really hope Randy Falco, Ron Grant, and the new team over there let Netscape continue to grow because these systems could wind up being the core of the next generation portals.

My plan was to go to 50 Navigators with six months, and I think Netscape is at around 25. I highly encourage the team over there to get right to 50 Navigators @ $1,000 a month and then start a second program with 200 Navigators at $500 a month. This second group of Navigators who have a lower hurdle of work (say 100 stories per month baseline), but would be focused on the 30 channels. So, you would have 250 Navigators total with 6-10 on each channel. This would make the channels full and give Netscape a chance--for only $250,000 a month--to really own the broad social news space.

As the story showed digg, reddit, delicious, and Newsvine are the perfect place to look for emerging talent and pay them.

If I was CEO of StumbleUpon I would raise $10M and pay the top 250 folks $500 a month for contributing to the system. It would make the system go off the charts.

Anyway, I'm out of the social news business... although I wish I wasn't I really love what Netscape's doing and I talk to members of the team and community over there on a daily basis.

PS - The 9.0 browser is amazing!!! Great job... don't forget my News drop down menu!

We just moved into our new house and I figured I would give TimeWarner HD cable and their DVR a try. Mind you I'm coming from a Direct TV HD and a Tivo (non-HD tivo).

Now, the cable modem from TimeWarner is just fine. 5-6MB down, 700k up. Fine. However, HD on TimeWarner cable here in Brentwood really looks like crap. I have a 1080p LCD from Samsung and you can really see the bitmapping of the screen. Basketball looks horrible. Like really bad unless folks at standing still--which they don't do a lot in the NBA. Is this because they are compressing the signals or is because I'm on a slower block do you think?

The PVR is beyond horrible. The software looks like it was written in 1983 in DOS and the latency is sad. Oh, did I mention the thing hangs all the time?!? Tivo is a Mercedes this PVR is like a broken down Datsun.

As I was about to write this blog post I found my pal Walt over at WSJ HAD THE SAME EXACT EXPERIENCE with Comcast's Cable service.

My thoughts:

1. If anyone at the cable companies is listening: PLEASE USE TIVO'S SOFTWARE. Make it happen. You guys are never gonna make as a good a unit as Tivo.
2. Tivo if you're listening: GIVE THE CABLE COMPANIES A GOOD DEAL so they will use your software.
3. DirecTV: I'm sorry I ever doubted you. You may not have the channels but your HD signal is amazing. I love you.

-- Looks like the WSJ does link to blogs directly... sometimes.
-- Lost was great the other night... Dave agrees. Collective unconscious anyone?
-- Looks like the trolls have taken over Wikipedia. I've been trying to take a hate/stalker site out of Xeni's bio with no luck. The criticism sections of wikipedia pages are the new slander sections... things that are totally insignificant are being included for folks on the same level as important stuff. The wisdom of the masses my ass.
-- Looks like we picked the right verticals to go after. Well, duh?
-- XBOX 360 press conference!