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BURLINGAME, Calif.--There is life after Google--though the increasing number of search alternatives popping up around the U.S. are careful not to take the search giant head-on.

With three-quarters of all search traffic, Google (nasdaq: GOOG - news - people ) might seem unassailable. But potential competitors are busy developing new ways of finding information and hunting down the investors they need to support them. Last year, more than 50 new search companies raised $330 million in venture financing, according to MoneyTree.

So how are these aspiring search engines proceeding? Mostly, by not following the example of Cuil.com (pronounced "cool"). Cuil's name means "knowledge" in Gaelic, but it might as well stand for "cautionary tale."

The Menlo Park, Calif.-based company was founded by former Google executives and made a splash when it debuted last May by bragging of a search index three times the size of Google's. It got the expected traffic bump from curiosity seekers, but traffic quickly cooled off as people returned to Google. However better Cuil might have been than Google, it wasn't better enough to get users to make the switch.

In Pictures: 10 Search Engines To Watch

Lesson learned. "There's really not much point in building another search engine," says Anand Rajaraman, co-founder of Kosmix, one of the new, specialized search companies. Trying to out-Google Google, he says, "is the wrong attitude and the wrong approach."

The right approach, investors hope, is the sort of niche-oriented search offered by Like.com. The San Mateo, Calif.-based company started life in 2004 as a facial-recognition software, aiming to help users sort and tag their photos. But Chief Executive Munjal Shah revamped it for shopping. Give Like.com a picture of a product you like--such as a favorite watch--and its computers will find stores selling it, as well as suggest alternatives. The site is especially popular with women shopping for shoes.

Shah says Like.com was able to use roughly 80% of the code from the previous iteration of his computer vision technology, and is now forecasting $20 million in revenues this year, up from $10 million last year and $1 million the year before.

Rather than use pictures, another new search engine, Aardvark, asks questions. Pose it a query, and Aardvark looks through your extended social network, pulling information from sites like Facebook. The search engine finds those best in a position to field your question and asks them if they'd care to answer it. It then forwards whatever answers it gets.

To a reporter's question, "What's a good cure for writer's block?," Aardvark was able, in a couple of minutes, to come back with advice from Joe M. in New York: "Force yourself to write 3-5 paragraphs about a topic: Go to a book on your shelf, open to page 87. Paragraph 3, and the first noun and that will be your topic."

Aardvark says that over time, its software gets smarter about which users are the most likely to answer questions on which topics.

In contrast, Kosmix is trying to carve out a new niche by smartly combining results from other search engines. In response to a topic search, its computers automatically create a page full of information, pulled from big sites like Wikipedia and YouTube, as well as blogs, Twitter feeds and more.

Rajaraman and Kosmix Co-Founder Venky Harinarayan say their computers comb through 10,000 Web sites and applications. Want to research a trip to Hawaii? Kosmix can find you opinions from Twitter, a guide on Mahalo and the latest photos from Flickr, then display it all on one page ordered by relevance.

Users also see advertisements, of course; all of these sites plan on making money by selling ads or cashing in on affiliate referral fees.

The new mini-search engines are still a tiny part of search, estimated to have less than 2% of total search traffic. But Web traffic monitor Hitwise says they are growing rapidly. Kosmix has seen its market-share grow 730% year-over-year. On Microsoft (nasdaq: MSFT - news - people )-owned Powerset, which answers questions asked in plain English, traffic is double from that of a year ago.

These companies sense an opening in part because Google searches continue to get longer, with users giving it more and more search terms in the hopes of finding ever-more detailed niche information.

Forrester Research analyst Shar VanBoskirk says it isn't a technology gap with Google that is holding these companies back. Rather, she said, they have to deal with the juggernaut of the Google brand. "The biggest problem I see facing any emerging search engine is the same problem facing Microsoft, which is critical mass of users," she says.

And even if the new search engines persuade users to try more than just Google, they still face the prospect of Google moving into their turf. Blog search used to be a separate market segment in search, with several companies battling to dominate. After Google added blog search to its main search menu, there was the predictable shake-out.

Of course, this also means that should any of these companies become a success inside their niche, they would become a Google acquisition target--which may be all the motivation any of them need. "I think it's fair to say that the conventional search game is over," says Kosmix's Rajaraman. "But that doesn't mean the Internet game is over."

Everything you need to know to make sure you get a signal after Feb. 17.

In Pictures: 10 Tips For Switching To Digital TV

At the stroke of midnight on Feb. 17, 2009, the analog transmissions that have beamed free television over the air in the United States for over half a century will disappear for good. They will be replaced by digital signals, many of which are already broadcasting, in what will be the most significant change to television since the introduction of color.

The "digital switchover" brings with it higher image quality, better sound and a level of versatility and flexibility previously unattainable through free television. It also brings with it a number of significant headaches, as confusion over exactly who will be affected is inspiring panic in viewers fearful of being left behind in a haze of snow and static as the rest of the country moves into the future. Many of those who will be affected know that the deadline is fast approaching, but are unsure of how to prepare for it. Thankfully, a solution is simple, easily attainable and won't cost you a dime.

There are two major reasons for the switch from analog TV broadcasts to digital TV. First, digital signals offer superior image quality and allow for the transmission of high-definition signals over the air. This means that a properly equipped HDTV can receive local high-definition broadcasts that will look about as good as what you'd get from cable or satellite television.

In Pictures: 10 Tips For Switching To Digital TV

Second, switching from analog to digital frees up real estate on the broadcast spectrum for other uses, as digital signals are more efficient and take up less bandwidth. Telecommunications companies like Verizon (nyse: VZ - news - people ) and AT&T (nyse: T - news - people ) have spent nearly $20 billion to secure the rights to the frequencies that were previously occupied by channels 52 through 69, in the hopes of using that airspace to improve their wireless communication networks.

What the digital switchover is actually doing is changing the language that TV broadcasters use to communicate with your television. Since 1941, televisions in the U.S. have utilized a set of broadcast standards laid out by the National Television System Committee. Big broadcast towers sent out information over the air using these NTSC standards and were picked up by the television antenna in your living room. Inside your TV, an NTSC tuner interpreted the information and properly displayed it on screen.

The digital switchover is introducing a new language, a new set of broadcast standards, this one designed by the Advanced Television Systems Committee. On Feb. 17, those broadcast towers are going to stop speaking NTSC permanently and start speaking ATSC. But unfortunately, your old television set doesn't know how to translate ATSC into moving pictures and sound. Just about all televisions manufactured and sold after Mar. 1, 2007 feature ATSC tuners, but if you purchased a television any earlier than that, chances are your TV won't be able to pick up over-the-air broadcasts once the switchover occurs.

The solution: A digital converter box, essentially an external ATSC tuner that sits on top of your existing television and is linked between your antenna and your TV. The ATSC signals are grabbed by the same antenna you've always used, then passed to the digital converter box that translates the ATSC signals into something your NTSC television can understand. They are easy to hook up and available at a wide variety of stores, including big box stores like Best Buy (nyse: BBY - news - people ), Wal-Mart (nyse: WMT - news - people ) and Target (nyse: TGT - news - people ), as well as online retailers.

Obama Goes After Farm Subsidies

Obama Goes After Farm Subsidies

In a speech just concluded announcing two more economy appointees -- CBO chief Peter Orszag to the Office of Management and Budget and Robert Nabors (House Approp. Comm.) to be his deputy -- President-elect Obama gave an example of one piece of wasteful government spending: farm subsidies.

Obama cited a GAO report out yesterday that said from 2003 to 2006, "millionaire farmers" got $49 million in farm subsidies despite earning more than the $2.5 million cutoff in annual income.

"If it's true," Obama said, "it's a prime example of waste."

With the announcement, Obama joins a long and largely defeated line of presidents and officials who've tried to kill farm subsidies, a perk as deeply ingrained in a nation built on the Jeffersonian Agricultural Ideal as any other.

Subsidies have been constructed and preserved by powerful Midwest lawmakers and are very difficult to pry loose.

To the president-elect, we say: Good luck with that. Let us know how it works out for you.

Orszag, Obama said, "doesn't need a map to tell him where the bodies are buried in the federal budget."

One place to start digging is the Nation's Breadbasket. The president-elect may be wise to be on the lookout for a Combine Army motoring to Washington to preserve the subsidies.