Mahalo goes social (maybe I’ll get credit for showing you how it works)

12Dec07

Mahalo, the human powered search engine, has some new social features that could really help get you better and more relevant search results. Mahalo Social, obviously named for its social networking abilities, allows users on Mahalo to create profiles, make friends, yada, yada, yada. Really, it’s not as boring as it sounds. First of all, now you can easily submit links to sites that you think are relevant in search results. The links are reviewed by Mahalo managers and if you submit a bad link, everyone will know. They’ll know because your Mahalo Social profile contains a ranking of links recommended, links accepted, and banned links. The more links that are accepted, the higher your ranking will be. If you submit links that end up banned, then your ranking will go down. All of your recommended links are in your profile as well as any of your friends links. If you add someone as a friend and they add you as well, then your links will show up on their profile page. You can also add links to profiles from other social networking sites you belong to like MySpace, YouTube, or Facebook. On the result pages, there’s now an option to start a discussion about the page itself. You’ll also be given credit on the result page, should your link be accepted. For example, there’s a page for “how to use Mahalo Social“. If someone were to add a link to this demo then their profile would appear on the page.

I think these are all great additions to Mahalo. I only have one question: Where is the Mahalo page for “screencast”? Alright, alright, here’s my screencast tour of Mahalo Social:

Flash Demo3m7s

Filed under: search, social networking |
Tags: Mahalo, search, social networking

6 Responses to “Mahalo goes social (maybe I’ll get credit for showing you how it works)”

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1 sean percival on December 13, 2007 said:

We always enjoy your demos of Mahalo, thanks for creating this. A link was added to our Mahalo Social page:

http://www.mahalo.com/Mahalo_Social

Thanks,
Sean
2 demogirl on December 13, 2007 said:

Thanks so much, Sean!
3 allen on December 13, 2007 said:

Hum… Molly you note that the more links one submits, their rank goes up - why do I care what my rank is on Mahalo? In all seriousness, what does it get me?
4 demogirl on December 13, 2007 said:

Allen, I honestly don’t think it gets you anything more than credibility. If I’m searching for “iPod” on Mahalo and I see someone submitted a link to a discount store, I’m going to check out their profile to see what their ranking is. If they have a bunch of banned links or a low ranking, I may not trust the source they suggested. I really think it’s all about creating trust within the Mahalo community. Some people live by ratings and reviews and by giving the people themselves rankings (which I believe to be the same as a rating) some will trust their suggestions more. If you have a higher ranking I also may add you as a friend to see what other sort of links you know about. I may be wrong, and if so, hopefully Sean or Jason will stop by and clear it up for us.
5 Cliff Allen on December 29, 2007 said:

This is exactly what I needed to decide to create an account there. I’ve become reluctant to keep creating accounts on social networking sites, but this looks valuable. Thanks!
6 Justin on March 13, 2008 said:

This is a great site, and I use it to promote my own business. Great Ideas!