Valleywag's Nick Douglas compared search engines ChaCha, Search Wikia, Tall Street, Powerset, Snap, Eurekster, Hakia and Freebase chances in becoming the next Google; to compare search results the query "House" was used (based on the popular TV show "House").  According to Nick Douglas, Freebase has a 1.2/1 chance of being the next Google while Powerset has a 5/1 chance.

There - I took a long post and put it into one short paragraph - the essential meaning.  I even looked at all the comments to see if there was more information - nothing worth noting.

To me, the eight search engines that wish they were the next Google are eight brands of the same thing.  Compare Google to Wonder Bread, Yahoo to Pepperidge Farms and Microsoft Live to Levi's Rye Bread ….. and then you have tons of niche, boutique brands…too many to stock on one shelf.

Which is my point - an infinite number of search engines could exist - each claiming to be a better solution to Google, if given a chance - the internet is not a bread shelf in the Supermarket or Grocery Store ….. but the Human Mind works more like a Grocery Shelf - we only store information on a couple of brands per category that we'll tend to use.   If your a wine connaisseur, you might know of hundreds of brands - and if your a search connaisseur, you might know of dozens of search engines - but most people, 99%, will only use one or two search engines.

Meaning, technical innovations will not create the next Google, but a great Branding idea might.   Anyone of these search services could be better than Google for all I know; people chose Google, they will not switch to Snap, even if Snap turns out to be a better search engine.