Yahoo goes into mind-reading mode

Yahoo has kicked off its Search Suggest feature, designed to save users time by offering suggestions they can click on, according to Yahoo Search Blog

Take CNET, one of my favorite search terms, for example. Users enter "CNET" into the search box. A drop-down menu appears with a list of suggestions, ranging from "cnet" to "cnet downloads" to "cnet networks downloads," and on and on and on. So many CNET sites, so little time.

Users typing in "zoo elephant jungle" will receive assistance on the first three words, but after typing in a couple words, Search Suggest fades away and leaves users on their own.

Yahoo dabbled with a suggestible-search feature as far back as 2005, which was tagged as "Instant Search," according to a posting in TechCrunch, which was quick to note the arrival of Yahoo Search Suggest.

And Yahoo itself points out that it launched this Search Suggest feature for its Yahoo Toolbar in Firefox last March. Users are also able to use Search Suggest in Firefox when Yahoo is selected as the search engine.