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Ask.com (originally known as Ask Jeeves) is a
question answering Question answering (QA) is a computer science discipline within the fields of information retrieval and natural language processing (NLP), which is concerned with building systems that automatically answer questions posed by humans in a natural l ...
–focused e-business founded in 1996 by Garrett Gruener and
David Warthen David Warthen (born December 10, 1957) was one of the founders of Ask Jeeves, now called Ask.com, an internet search engine. Warthen has served as Chief Technology Officer or Vice President of Engineering for a variety of companies, many of them sta ...
in
Berkeley Berkeley most often refers to: *Berkeley, California, a city in the United States **University of California, Berkeley, a public university in Berkeley, California * George Berkeley (1685–1753), Anglo-Irish philosopher Berkeley may also refer ...
,
California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...
. The original software was implemented by Gary Chevsky, from his own design. Warthen, Chevsky, Justin Grant, and others built the early AskJeeves.com website around that core engine. In 2006, the "Jeeves" name was dropped and they refocused on the
search engine A search engine is a software system designed to carry out web searches. They search the World Wide Web in a systematic way for particular information specified in a textual web search query. The search results are generally presented in a ...
, which had its own algorithm. In late 2010, facing insurmountable competition from more popular search engines like
Google Google LLC () is an American multinational technology company focusing on search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, artificial intelligence, and consumer electronics. ...
, the company outsourced its web search technology and returned to its roots as a
question and answer site The following is a list of websites that follow a question-and-answer format. The list contains only websites for which an article exists, dedicated either wholly or at least partly to the websites. For the ''humor'' "Q&A site" format first popul ...
.
Douglas Leeds Doug Leeds (born 16 May 1968), is the Chief Executive Officer of IAC Publishing, a digital media operating group launched on December 9, 2015, by media and Internet conglomerate IAC. The single digital media publisher reaches 100 million monthly u ...
was elevated from president to CEO in 2010. Three venture capital firms,
Highland Capital Partners Highland Capital Partners is a global venture capital firm with offices in Boston, Silicon Valley, and San Francisco. Highland has raised over $4 billion in committed capital and invested in more than 280 companies, with 47 IPOs and 134 Acquisi ...
,
Institutional Venture Partners Institutional Venture Partners (IVP) is a US-based private equity investment firm focusing on later-stage venture capital and growth equity investments. IVP is one of the oldest venture capital firms, founded in 1980. History While Reid W. Denn ...
, and The RODA Group were early investors. Ask.com is currently owned by
InterActiveCorp IAC Inc. is an American holding company that owns brands across 100 countries, mostly in media and Internet. The company is incorporated under Delaware General Corporation Law and headquartered in New York City. Joey Levin, who previously led t ...
(IAC) under the
NASDAQ The Nasdaq Stock Market () (National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations Stock Market) is an American stock exchange based in New York City. It is the most active stock trading venue in the US by volume, and ranked second ...
symbol , and its corporate headquarters are located at
555 City Center 555 City Center is a 20-storey, story, skyscraper in the Oakland City Center, City Center complex of downtown Oakland, California. The building was completed in 2002, and designed by Korth Sunseri Hagey Architects of San Francisco for Shorenste ...
, in the Oakland City Center development in downtown
Oakland, California Oakland is the largest city and the county seat of Alameda County, California, United States. A major West Coast of the United States, West Coast port, Oakland is the largest city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area, the third ...
.


History

Ask.com was originally known as Ask Jeeves, "Jeeves" being the name of a "gentleman's personal gentleman", or valet, fetching answers to any question asked. The character was named after
Jeeves Jeeves (born Reginald Jeeves, nicknamed Reggie) is a fictional character in a series of comedic short stories and novels by English author P. G. Wodehouse. Jeeves is the highly competent valet of a wealthy and idle young Londoner named Bertie W ...
, Bertie Wooster's valet in the fictional works of P. G. Wodehouse. The original idea behind Ask Jeeves was to allow users to get answers to questions in everyday,
natural language In neuropsychology, linguistics, and philosophy of language, a natural language or ordinary language is any language that has evolved naturally in humans through use and repetition without conscious planning or premeditation. Natural languages ...
, and traditional keyword searching. The current Ask.com still supports this for math, dictionary, and conversion questions. Ask Jeeves launched in beta in mid-April 1997 and fully launched on June 1, 1997. On September 18, 2001, Ask Jeeves acquired
Teoma Teoma (from Scottish Gaelic ''teòma'' "expert") was an Internet search engine founded in April 2000 by Professor Apostolos Gerasoulis and his colleagues at Rutgers University in New Jersey. Professor Tao Yang from the University of California, Sa ...
for over $1.5 million. In July 2005, Ask Jeeves was acquired by IAC. In February 2006, Jeeves was removed from Ask Jeeves and the search engine rebranded to Ask. On May 16, 2006, Ask implemented a "Binoculars Site Preview" into its search results. On search results pages, the "binoculars" let searchers have a preview of the page they could visit with a mouse-over activating a pop-up screenshot. On June 5, 2007, Ask.com relaunched with a 3D look. In December 2007, Ask released the AskEraser feature, allowing users to opt-out from tracking of search queries and IP and
cookie A cookie is a baked or cooked snack or dessert that is typically small, flat and sweet. It usually contains flour, sugar, egg, and some type of oil, fat, or butter. It may include other ingredients such as raisins, oats, chocolate chips, n ...
values. They also vowed to erase this data after 18 months if the AskEraser option is not set.
HTTP cookies HTTP cookies (also called web cookies, Internet cookies, browser cookies, or simply cookies) are small blocks of data created by a web server while a user is browsing a website and placed on the user's computer or other device by the user's we ...
must be enabled for AskEraser to function. On July 4, 2008, Ask acquired Lexico Publishing Group, which owns
Dictionary.com Dictionary.com is an online dictionary whose domain was first registered on May 14, 1995. The primary content on Dictionary.com is a proprietary dictionary based on ''Random House Unabridged Dictionary'', with editors for the site providing new a ...
, Thesaurus.com, and
Reference.com Reference.com is an online encyclopedia that organizes content that uses a question-and-answer format. Articles are organized into hierarchical categories. Before IAC (company), IAC restructured the site following an acquisition in 2008, Refer ...
. In August 2008, Ask launched the Ask Kids search engine designed for children. In April 2009, Jeeves returned to the UK version of Ask.com, redesigned as a CGI character and the website was once again named Ask Jeeves, though international versions were still just Ask.com. His image remained on the UK website until July 21, 2016, though the Ask Jeeves name would continue to be used until September 21, 2016, when the website rebranded to just Ask. On July 26, 2010, Ask.com released a closed-beta Q&A service. The service was released to the public on July 29, 2010. Ask.com launched its mobile Q&A app for the iPhone in late 2010. Ask.com reached 100 million global users per month in 2012 through its website with more than 2 million downloads of its flagship mobile app in that year. The company has also released additional apps spun out of its Q&A experience, including Ask Around in 2011 and PollRoll in 2012.


Search engine shut-down

In 2010, Ask.com abandoned the search industry, with the loss of 130 search engineering jobs, because it could not compete against more popular search engines such as
Google Google LLC () is an American multinational technology company focusing on search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, artificial intelligence, and consumer electronics. ...
. Earlier in the year, Ask had launched a Q&A community for generating answers from real people as opposed to search algorithms then combined this with its question-and–answer repository, utilizing its extensive history of archived query data to search sites that provide answers to questions people have. To avoid a situation in which no answers were available from its own resources, the company outsourced to an unnamed third-party search provider the comprehensive web search matches that it had gathered itself.


Ask Sponsored Listings

Formerly the direct-sales engine for Ask.com, Ask Sponsored Listings is no longer available, having merged with Sendori, an operating business of IAC, in 2011.


Corporate details

Ask Jeeves, Inc. stock traded on the NASDAQ stock exchange from July 1999 to July 2005, under the ticker symbol ASKJ. In July 2005, the ASKJ ticker was retired upon the acquisition by IAC, valued at US$1.85 billion. In 2012, Ask.com made two acquisitions as part of a larger strategy to offer more content on the Ask.com website. On July 2, 2012, Ask.com purchased content discovery start-up nRelate for an undisclosed amount. That was followed by the company's acquisition of expert advice and information site About.com, which closed in September 2012. On August 14, 2014, Ask.com acquired popular social networking website ASKfm, where users can ask other users questions, with the option of anonymity. As of August 14, 2014, Ask.fm had 180 million monthly unique users in more than 150 countries around the world, with its largest user base in the United States. Available on the web and as a mobile app, ASKfm generates an estimated 20,000 questions per minute with approximately 45 percent of its mobile
monthly active users Active users is a measurement metric that is commonly used to measure the level of engagement for a particular product or object, by quantifying the number of active interactions from visitors within a relevant range of time (daily, weekly and m ...
logging in daily. , the mobile app has been downloaded more than 40 million times. In 2021, Ask re-launched its ''SymptomFind'' brand and introduced the new finance-focused ''Ask Money'' site.


Marketing and promotion

Apostolos Gerasoulis, the co-creator of Ask's Teoma algorithmic search technology, starred in four television advertisements in 2007, extolling the virtues of Ask.com's usefulness for information relevance. A Jeeves balloon appeared in the
Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade The Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade is an annual parade in New York City presented by the U.S.-based department store chain Macy's. The Parade first took place in 1924, tying it for the second-oldest Thanksgiving parade in the United States with ...
through 2000–2004. After a hiatus from mass consumer marketing, Ask returned to TV advertising in the fall of 2011 after refocusing its site on questions and answers. Instead of national advertising, Ask focused on local markets. In the summer of 2012, Ask launched a national cinema campaign, along with other out-of-home tactics in certain markets such as New York and
Seattle Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest regio ...
. As part of a Seattle-based local market effort, Ask.com launched its "You Asked We Answered" campaign in 2012, in which the company "answered" residents' top complaints about living in their city, including easing morning commutes and stadium traffic, as well as keeping the local Parks and Rec department wading pools open. On January 14, 2009, Ask.com became the official sponsor of 2000
NASCAR The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, LLC (NASCAR) is an American auto racing sanctioning and operating company that is best known for stock car racing. The privately owned company was founded by Bill France Sr. in 1948, and hi ...
Sprint Cup Series Champion Bobby Labonte's No. 96 Ford. Ask would become the official search engine of NASCAR. Ask.com was the primary sponsor for the No. 96 for 18 of the first 21 races and had rights to increase this to a total of 29 races that season. The Ask.com car debuted in the 2009 Bud Shootout where it failed to finish the race, but subsequently returned strongly, placing as high as 5th in a March 1, 2009,
Shelby 427 The AC Cobra, sold in the United States as the Shelby Cobra and AC Shelby Cobra, is a sports car manufactured by British company AC Cars, with a Ford V8 engine. It was produced intermittently in both the United Kingdom and later the United ...
race at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. Ask.com's foray into NASCAR represented the first instance of its venture into what it calls " Super Verticals".


References


External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Ask.Com Companies based in Oakland, California AskJeeves Internet search engines Desktop search engines IAC (company) Online companies of the United States Internet properties established in 1996 Pay-per-click search engines Question-and-answer websites 1999 initial public offerings 2005 mergers and acquisitions