Ask for directions while driving using iPhone with the new Ask.com

For those of you who haven’t been paying attention, Ask.com has fired the butler and released tons of new search features to take on Google. Although we love Ask’s gorgeous new home page and their award-winning 3D search results, we wonder who writes their search algorithm (type in “is it legal” and read the suggestions to see what we mean). Even more disconcerting is the absence of our Touchtip home page when searching “iphone tips”. We’re currently ranking #1 in Google, #9 in Yahoo, and no where to be seen in the Ask results. Oh well, we’ll let them slide for getting rid of that ugly butler and adding a killer new feature that is great for getting directions on the iPhone, especially when driving. It uses voice recognition, and this is how you use it.

1. Go to the mobile version of Ask at m.ask.com
2. Click on the “voice directions” link
3. You will see a phone number to call, tap it to switch to phone mode
4. Follow the voice prompts to give your starting point and destination
5. Ask.com will send you an SMS with the directions for you

This is great for iPhone users that need directions while driving and can’t navigate the built-in Map.app with their hands on the steering wheel.

Extra kudos to Ask.com for earning a spot in PC World’s list of 25 Most Innovative Products of the Year (Ask.com is #24 on the list, the iPhone is #2). Ask’s 3D search results earns them this spot beating out universal and blended search results from the big “G”. We’d probably agree with them if Touchtip was ranking where it should be. C’mon Ask, show us some love.