Comparison shopping agent
Encyclopedia
Comparison shopping agents, also called shopbots
,
, are web-based intelligent software applications that can help online shoppers find lower price for commodities or services. Price comparison services were the earliest services provided by a comparison shopping agent. To search the price of a particular item, a comparison shopping agent would search multiple online stores based on the keyword the online shopper provides. The keyword could be an ISBN number of a book or something like "iPod."
The first widely recognized comparison-shopping agent was BargainFinder developed by then Andersen Consulting (now Accenture) and its SmartStore center in 1995 for an experiment.
The first commercial shopping agent, called Jango, was produced by Netbot
, a Seattle startup company founded by University of Washington
professors Oren Etzioni and Daniel S. Weld
; Netbot was acquired by the Excite
portal in late 1997. Junglee, a Bay-area startup, also pioneered comparison shopping technology and was soon acquired by Amazon.com
. Other early comparison shopping agents include pricewatch.com and killerapp.com. Most of them were price comparison for computer related products used by geeks thus didn't attract much public attention.
In the early development stage from 1995 to 2000, comparison shopping agents include not only price comparison but also rating and review services for online vendors and products. For example, services like Bizrate.com provides ratings service for online vendors. Websites like Epinion.com provides review and rating service for products. Altogether they consisted three broad categories of comparison shopping services.
Later, through merger and acquisition, these services were consolidated. As a result, shopping.com
, PriceGrabber
and shopzilla
became the top three comparison shopping agents since 2000.
Comparison shopping agents may be considered early examples of the Semantic Web
, but early systems used wrappers to extract structured information about products from Web pages. Wrapper construction requires extensive programming and results in a fragile system, since they need to be reprogrammed when an online store changes its layout. Modern comparison shopping systems get most of their data from relational data feeds generated by retailers. While this typically yields more robust results, it requires retailer cooperation and may produce less comprehensive listings.
,
, are web-based intelligent software applications that can help online shoppers find lower price for commodities or services. Price comparison services were the earliest services provided by a comparison shopping agent. To search the price of a particular item, a comparison shopping agent would search multiple online stores based on the keyword the online shopper provides. The keyword could be an ISBN number of a book or something like "iPod."
The first widely recognized comparison-shopping agent was BargainFinder developed by then Andersen Consulting (now Accenture) and its SmartStore center in 1995 for an experiment.
The first commercial shopping agent, called Jango, was produced by Netbot
Netbot
Netbot was the first commercial Internet price comparison service. Founded by University of Washington Computer Science professors Oren Etzioni and Daniel S. Weld the company was funded by ARCH Venture Partners, Alta Partners and the Madrona Venture Group....
, a Seattle startup company founded by University of Washington
University of Washington
University of Washington is a public research university, founded in 1861 in Seattle, Washington, United States. The UW is the largest university in the Northwest and the oldest public university on the West Coast. The university has three campuses, with its largest campus in the University...
professors Oren Etzioni and Daniel S. Weld
Daniel S. Weld
Daniel S. Weld is the Thomas J. Cable/WRF Professor of Computer Science and Engineering at the University of Washington, where he does research in automated planning and scheduling, software agents, and Internet information extraction....
; Netbot was acquired by the Excite
Excite
Excite is a collection of Internet sites and services owned by IAC Search & Media, which is a subsidiary of InterActive Corporation . Launched in 1994, it is an online service offering a variety of content, including an Internet portal, a search engine, a web-based email, instant messaging, stock...
portal in late 1997. Junglee, a Bay-area startup, also pioneered comparison shopping technology and was soon acquired by Amazon.com
Amazon.com
Amazon.com, Inc. is a multinational electronic commerce company headquartered in Seattle, Washington, United States. It is the world's largest online retailer. Amazon has separate websites for the following countries: United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Japan, and...
. Other early comparison shopping agents include pricewatch.com and killerapp.com. Most of them were price comparison for computer related products used by geeks thus didn't attract much public attention.
In the early development stage from 1995 to 2000, comparison shopping agents include not only price comparison but also rating and review services for online vendors and products. For example, services like Bizrate.com provides ratings service for online vendors. Websites like Epinion.com provides review and rating service for products. Altogether they consisted three broad categories of comparison shopping services.
Later, through merger and acquisition, these services were consolidated. As a result, shopping.com
Shopping.com
Shopping.com is a price comparison service owned by eBay and operates websites in USA, United Kingdom, France, Germany and Australia. Shopping.com started out with the name DealTime.com which still operates as a related, but otherwise separate website....
, PriceGrabber
PriceGrabber
PriceGrabber.com is a price comparison service. They've partnered with more than 13,000 merchants, retailers, and sellers and provide free information on millions of products in 25 different categories...
and shopzilla
Shopzilla
Shopzilla is a price comparison service. Founded in June 1996 by Farhad Mohit and Henri Asseily as Binary Compass Enterprises, the company changed its name to BizRate.com in January 1999...
became the top three comparison shopping agents since 2000.
Comparison shopping agents may be considered early examples of the Semantic Web
Semantic Web
The Semantic Web is a collaborative movement led by the World Wide Web Consortium that promotes common formats for data on the World Wide Web. By encouraging the inclusion of semantic content in web pages, the Semantic Web aims at converting the current web of unstructured documents into a "web of...
, but early systems used wrappers to extract structured information about products from Web pages. Wrapper construction requires extensive programming and results in a fragile system, since they need to be reprogrammed when an online store changes its layout. Modern comparison shopping systems get most of their data from relational data feeds generated by retailers. While this typically yields more robust results, it requires retailer cooperation and may produce less comprehensive listings.