Press
Information for Press
- Aardvark discovers the perfect person to answer any question in minutes.
- It’s easy:
- Just send Aardvark a question in plain English, like you would to a friend.
- You’ll get a personal response in about 5 minutes.
- You can use Aardvark on the web at www.vark.com, and through your existing communication channels: IM programs (like Gmail Chat, AIM, Yahoo! Messenger, and MSN Messenger), Twitter, iPhone, and any email program.
- Aardvark works out-of-the-box: it uses your existing profile data, and the existing data about your social network, from Facebook or your email address book. (Support for other social networks coming soon.)
- You can ask Aardvark anything. A few popular subjects:
- Travel tips
- Restaurant & bar recommendations
- Product reviews/opinions
- Local services and entertainment suggestions
- Music, movie, TV, and book recommendations
- Technology & programming help
- Business & school research
- Home/Cooking/Gardening ideas
- Career & relationship advice
- In 2008 the Aardvark team built out the core Aardvark product, while conducting an extensive user-research campaign to refine the user experience for this new Social Search paradigm. This work culminated in a series of beta releases in Summer 2009, making Aardvark available over email, Instant Messenger, Twitter, and the iPhone. Following the popular success of these applications, Aardvark publically launched Social Search on the web in October 2009, open to everyone at vark.com.
- The Aardvark team is obsessed with creating a great user experience: a simple chat interface, high-quality questions and answers, and an advanced algorithm that discovers the perfect person for any question.
- In February 2010 Aardvark was acquired by Google. Read more about it on our blog.
Aardvark in the News
- 2/5/2010 - New York Times: A Search Engine That Relies on Humans
- 2/2/2010 - TechCrunch: Aardvark Publishes A Research Paper Offering Unprecedented Insights Into Social Search
- 2/2/2010 - O'Reilly Radar: Forget Google, social search is all about mobile
- 1/19/2010 - MacWorld: Aardvark Mobile
- 1/14/2010 - PBS: Q&A 2.0: There's More Than One Way to Answer a Question
- 1/1/2010 - Scobleizer: Hot Startups to Watch in 2010
- 12/23/2009 - New York Times: Hurry, Hurry, Just Hours to Shop
- 12/21/2009 - ReadWriteWeb: Best LittleCo of 2009 & Most Promising for 2010
- 12/11/2009 - All Things Digital: Aardvark’s Max Ventilla and Damon Horowitz Speak (Plus a Tour!)
- 12/11/2009 - ReadWriteWeb: Top 10 Startup Products of 2009
- 12/9/2009 - ReadWriteWeb: Top 10 Real-Time Technologies of 2009
- 12/3/09 - New York Times: What I Bought This Year
- 11/19/09 - Technology Review: Computers Can't Answer Everything
- 11/11/09 - Netted by the Webbys: Ask and Receive
- 11/3/09 - USA Today: Companies race to offer instant Web search, including Twitter
- 10/27/09 - Urban Daddy: Aard Times: The Smartest People in the Room
- 10/14/09 - Technology Live: Advice search engines use your friends to provide better results
- 10/14/09 - Reuters: Aardvark’s Internet search: No web pages required
- 10/14/09 - San Jose Mercury: Vark.com aims to blend human relationships with digital links
- 10/14/09 - TechCrunch: Aardvark Finally Puts Its Social Q&A On The Web
- 10/14/09 - San Francisco Chronicle: Vark takes its social answering service to the web
- 10/14/09 - GigaOm: Aardvark to Answer More Questions With Vark.com
- 10/14/09 - Download Squad: Aardvark's question-and-answer service gets a web interface
- 10/14/09 - ZDNet: Aardvark's new design: simpler, cleaner
- 10/14/09 - VentureBeat: Aardvark opens to the public, becomes a destination for questions
- 10/14/09 - SearchEngineLand: Aardvark Revamps Site, Becomes “Social Search Engine”
- 9/22/09 - New York Times: App of the Week: Your Questions, Expert Answers
- 9/15/09 - MacWorld: You've got questions, Aardvark Mobile has answers
- 9/15/09 - TechCrunch: Aardvark's iPhone App Is The Best Way To Use The Service Yet
- 9/15/09 - ReadWriteWeb: Got a Question? Ask Aardvark on the iPhone
- 9/15/09 - SearchEngineLand: Aardvark Launches iPhone App For Answers "On The Go"
- 9/15/09 - GigaOm: Aardvark Launches an iPhone App
- 9/3/09 - New York Times: Got a Burning Question? Ask the Net
- 8/24/09 - Time Magazine: 50 Best Websites 2009
- 7/30/09 - ZDNet: Aardvark: ask it anything, get an answer in 5 minutes
- 7/19/09 - NPR: Start-Up Uses Social Networks To Help Find Answers
- 7/8/09 - AP: Review: Need advice? Aardvark can sniff it out
- 7/7/09 - Wired: Ask and You Shall Receive (An Answer on Twitter)
- 7/7/09 - SearchEngineLand: "Help Engine" Aardvark Makes Twitter An Onramp For Q&A
- 6/27/09 - New York Times: Now All Your Friends Are in the Answer Business
- 6/27/09 - Techcrunch: Aardvark Open For Business Via Facebook Connect
- 6/6/09 - EveryJoe: Aardvark - Delivering a Bit More in Social Search
- 4/30/09 - ReadWriteWeb: The Robot Made Me Do It: Comparing Three New Cyborg Q&A Services
- 4/23/09 - BusinessWeek: Need an Answer? Ask Aardvark
- 3/13/09 - SF Chronicle: S.F. startup Aardvark personalizes searching
- 3/13/09 - CNET: Aardvark emerges: Social search that works
- 3/13/09 - Techcrunch: Aardvark Social Search Service Arrives
- 3/13/09 - SearchEngineLand: Aardvark “Help Engine” Opens To Wider Use
- 3/11/09 - John Battelle's Searchblog: Watch the Aardvark
- 3/10/09 - ReadWriteWeb: Aardvark: A Better Social Q&A Than Twitter
- 11/05/08 - VentureBeat: Social search product Aardvark: Yahoo Answers meets Twitter — but better
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