What makes one search engine better than another?

Will Google's "one size fits all" search engine strategy ultimately fail, giving rise to different search engines to serve different search audiences?

• Google has had to constantly change its algorithms to fight off those who want to game search; in the process they please/annoy different groups. Is it too much to expect one search engine to satisfy all search users and audiences worldwide?

• Answer:

  I'm not sure that "one size fits all" is an appropriate label. There's personalization, local search, social aspects such as +1, and more. Saying, "Google has had to constantly change its algorithm..." really makes it sound like they (or some other search engine) could design the perfect algorithm for today, tomorrow, and forever, which is clearly not possible. Things change. Marketing changes. Business changes. Google apparently makes hundreds of large and small adjustments to their search algorithm/s every year in an effort to constantly improve the end user experience and, as a result, the business. Not everyone is happy about all of these changes, but what do we really expect? Google is doing what is best for its business and the large majority of its users. There will always be room for smaller search engines to demonstrate where search can be improved, and if Google is agile and innovative, it will continue to watch and learn...just as Bing, Blekko, and plenty of other search engines do.