Sites That Let You Spy on Your Co-Surfers

I know what you’re thinking. In fact, I know what everyone on the Web is thinking, thanks to a number of online sites that turn the hunt for information into a spectator sport.

Take WebCrawler’s SearchVoyeur (https://webcrawler.com/SearchTicker.html), a feature that shows a random, live selection of the words people are typing into the search engine.

Go to the site and up pops a Java applet. Like a stock market ticker, the public’s search phrases stream across a horizontal window.

Several similar services are available, including MetaSpy (https://www.metaspy.com) and Ask Jeeves (https://aj.com), the natural-language-based search engine. The McKinley Group’s Magellan Internet Guide (https://voyeur.mckinley.com/cgi-bin/voyeur.cgi), which is owned by Excite Inc., posts 12 real-time searches that are refreshed every 15 seconds.

Simplicity and anonymity are the keys to all of these strangely appealing Web sites. WebCrawler says it receives more than 5 million queries a day, making it impossible for anyone--including staff at the search engine, also owned by Excite--to draw a connection between a particular search and the person who initiated it.

Traditionally, Netizens emphatically fight companies that use any sort of audience-tracking tools, such as cookies and demographic surveys. Yet when Web firms turn the issue around and present tracking as a form of entertainment, suddenly everyone wants to join in.

“It taps into that basic human instinct, plain old curiosity,” said Kris Carpenter, director of search services and directory for Excite. The service has been so popular, Excite is experimenting with the SearchVoyeur idea to create a similarly “flavored” product for its own search engine, Carpenter said.

“It’s a way for people, whether they’re new or more advanced, to experiment with searching the Web,” she said.

Quite often, these services provide lessons in how not to use search engines. Or they show that most people haven’t quite grasped the art of the search.

Indeed, watching the words slip by can be strangely intriguing, almost like sneaking a peek into someone’s mind--or the minds of thousands of people. And with this free service, you can click on the words and see for yourself the results of the search.

But you have to be fast on the mouse, or the chance to know what the person finds with “fast plants” will be gone forever.

So what is out there?

Not unexpectedly, some of it is sexually explicit. But most of it is odd, funny and wild: “pilot AND liscence” (learn to spell, dear); “hacker tips” (if you need them, you’re not one); “where can I get a really good price on an Alesis quadrasynth-8 keyboard?” (at least you know what you want).

Some results are amusing--particularly those that miss the mark. Imagine the poor schlump who was looking for adult entertainment and typed in “man love woman,” including the quote marks. The service dutifully pointed the seeker to seven links, none sexual. Instead, there were links to the Norway Online Information Service, two “South Park” fan sites and “The Language of Love in Gems and Jewels,” an online excerpt from Antiquorum Auctioneers.

MetaSpy provides similar glimpses into others’ queries with two viewer options, one for G-rated searches and another for the no-holds-barred MetaSpy Exposed. A quick visit to the “adult” site, however, revealed a list dominated by relatively benign subjects, such as Goethe and “architectural plans.”

But the best query, by far, was found at Ask Jeeves.

The question: Am I in love?

Jeeves’ reply: A link to a survey titled “How to Know When It Is Love?”

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