Find Alternative Search Engines

Alternative Search Engines covers the cutting-edge of specialized search engines, and is edited by Charles Knight, who bills himself as a "reformed SEO from Charlottesville, Virginia."

The intent of the service is to expand coverage of search engines to include over 1,000 alternative and niche search engines. The editorial attitude is supposedly not anti-Google, but pro-alternative search engines. The site's motto is:

The most wonderful search engines you’ve never seen.

This might be just the place to begin finding research tools for a writing project. Use Google and/or Yahoo! of course; however, if you are looking for information on a rather esoteric topic, better to use a device designed to find resources in just that area than to limit yourself to maybe just the first ten returns of a general search engine. Or to wallow through dozens of them.

At any rate, the site provides an interesting insight into search engine development and operations, and it's certain you will learn about tools you've probably never heard of. The reviews section should be especially useful for an overview. You can also search for information about a search service you may have read about, search using a tag cloud, and read debates on some pretty specialized issues. And more.