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by m-i-l·4y ago·view on hn ↗
> Does anyone here have experience trying to build a search engine, even a "boutique" one, for the web? Is it something an individual could conceivably operate on their own?

Yes, I've built a curated boutique search engine, such as that described in the article. Short summary is that yes, it is possible for one person to build a useful search engine nowadays, if they don't attempt to index the whole of the internet (the niche mine covers is personal and independent websites). I've plenty of details about building it in the blog at https://blog.searchmysite.net/ , but key points you might find useful:

- It is now indexing around 6.5M pages, which is around quarter of what Google indexed when it was launched in 1998.

- Estimated running costs are now looking to exceed US$1000 a year. (I could change hosting provider to reduce this.)

- In January 2021 I estimated I'd spent around 350 hours building it (evenings and weekends over the preceding year). I haven't estimated how long I have spent this year, but it won't be quite as much as last year.

1 comments
Such an interesting idea! I tried it just once, with 'startup ideas' and I can see how it gives more useful results than google for this simple phrase.

Do you make money with this project?

Thanks for your feedback. I was hoping that the paid listings for the search as a service would cover the running costs so it could be self-sustaining, although so far to be honest it is a long way off doing that.