Collarity Inc., a provider of community-based search technology, was  founded in mid-2005 by a group of developers. The Palo Alto, CA,  company today has 16 employees. The angel investors who funded  Excite@Home and other well-known Silicon Valley-based startups  primarily funded Collarity. Collarity senior vice president Debby Richman, a veteran of  LookSmart, About.com, Overstock.com and DB Information Services,  recently discussed the company's work and business model as well as  the opportunities for community-based search with DM News' Mickey  Alam Khan. Here are excerpts. MAK: How does Collarity's technology work? DR: Collarity harnesses the collective intelligence of site visitors  in the background, without asking them to tag, rate or save  information. This knowledge is then u