Who can compete with Google search besides Yahoo! and Microsoft?

Ever hear of Ask.com? The search website formerly known as Ask Jeeves was purchased by Barry Diller's InterActive Corp. last year. IAC has a habit of turning around distressed companies in the throes of losing marketshare. Can it work the same magic with Ask.com any time soon? This Fortune article, "Ask.com: Google's up-and-coming rival," seems to think it can.

But while Ask.com may display all relevant content to the web searcher before displaying any kind of advertising, does this make a business model work long-term? Google has success by displaying ads (very relevant in many cases) directly next to content after a search is performed. But the ads are non-obtrusive and in most cases, very relevant to the search at hand. Hence, they work as a business model -- a billion-dollar business model.

Ask.com's search features intuitively are better than Google's. A search brings up a good list of close-context search results that the searcher may be interested in, as opposed to a simple index of the entire web that Goggle produces for a search result. But Google's becoming more personalized as well -- search for the word "recipes" and you'll see some new drop-down boxes that allow the searcher to drill further into a specific search.

Ask.com wants to build a "better car" instead of Google's "faster car." Instead of "more revenue per search", Ask.com wants to make "more money through more searches." This is well and good. But taking marketshare from Google while branding Ask.com as a superior service is not going to be easy. This may be one of Diller's hardest battles to date.