Just how cool would it be if you had a team of people who could search the web for you? Who could look at sites like Amazon, and tell you about the best deals listed there? Who could look for local information such as public transportation hours and driving directions, and send it straight to you when they’ve found it? Well, that’s what Zypsy.com is all about.
Zypsy lets you recruit a team of people who will search the web from you when you’re away from your computer, and retrieve all the information you need. The way this service works is really simple, as you just have to dial a phone number (650-669-2299) and leave a voice message with your “mission” (IE, “find me a used tablet in mint condition for less than $250”). Zypsy.com employs a team of 24/7 mobile searchers that will then look for what you’ve requested, and once they’ve found it you will get a text message with the results.
This service is provided for free, and you don’t even need to register for an account to send a search request. Zypsy can be used on the fly. And note that if you want, you can start a search by sending out a text message instead of making a phone call.
Zypsy is a really useful platform, but one can’t help wondering how wise it is not to charge fees of any kind, and to provide these services without asking users to sign up first. Specially because Zypsy does something that I’m pretty sure people would be willing to pay good money for.
UPDATE: Zypsy didn’t make it through its first year. The service was discontinued at the end of 2007.
