Over at Search Engine Watch, Eric Enge does a long interview with Ask.com director of online information resources Gary Price. Gary is widely considered one of the smartest people in an industry overflowing with genius. A conversation with Gary is a whirlwind experience, which might seem strange to those who’ve only met the man.

Talking with Gary is literally like walking through the Web. His encyclopedic knowledge and ability to match seemingly unrelated points are uncanny and might even be unnerving if he carried or showed even an ounce of pretension in person. He does not, making him one of the most intellectually challenging but delightful people to speak with.

When Gary starts to explain even a small facet of the numerous search resources at Ask.com, it can be difficult to fully keep up with the rapid flow of information and ideas. That’s ok. You know he is guiding you to a most interesting place. By the time you get there, the maze of ideas he has guided you through will be lit by the light bulbs left floating above the places he took your head. Like I said, a conversation with Gary Price is an intellectually elegant, unforgettable experience.

In the interview, Gary gives some insights into his experience at Ask. One of the reasons he says he moved from his previous job as editor of Search Engine Watch is because of the leadership and vision offered by Jim Lanzone and the congeniality of his colleagues at Ask.

Ask has a huge range of excellent search products, none of which has caught on with consumes in the way Google or Yahoo offerings have. The article outlines several of them, some of which have been copied or innovated on by competitors. Gary, of course, is too polite to make a point of it but he is happy to note that Ask has features none of the others offer. (see the parts about AskCity and Maps)

Towards the end of the interview Gary talks about one of the most important points for researchers, academics and educators moving forward into the next decade. Though it often feels like we live in a uni-search world with Google being the world’s default search device, we need to use and expand the number of information resources that are already at our fingertips. As a good essay pulls from several sources, good research habits include getting information from different search tools and knowing how to use them.

Check out the interview at Search Engine Watch. It is well worth the read. After reading the piece, perhaps you might want to try a weekend using Ask.com, just to get a glimpse of what you’re probably missing.