Sure, we know those guys over at Google are pretty smart, but did you ever think that you could put together a better search engine then them? Maybe just customize things a little, so you could get your search results in a format that makes more sense to you? Thanks to Yahoo! you might just get that chance, thanks to the company's BOSS platform: Build your Own Search Service.

The idea behind BOSS is that Yahoo! gives developers access to the protocols used to interact with its search engine. They can set up their own site, with no Yahoo! branding to speak of, use the company's computers to crunch the search data, and then do whatever they want with the returned data. So sure, the raw results may be the same as you'd get by just searching with Yahoo! normally, but the ability for developers to process the results lets them present the information in new ways.

For instance, you could build a site like OneRiot that uses Yahoo! to search through news and social networks to generate results tied to what the latest, most popular topics online are. Or you could put together a page that presents search results graphically, showing users how everything is linked together.

BOSS started off free to use, but now Yahoo! is starting to charge for it. Luckily, the rates don't kick in until you're pulling over 10,000 queries a day, so developers can continue to tinker away at their ideas and not have to worry about the cost until they start getting really popular. If you think you've got something new worth bringing to the search engine table, give BOSS a shot and see what you come up with.
 

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