Ask.com, the search engine that started life as Ask Jeeves, shut down. Parent company IAC discontinued its search business as part of an ongoing effort to refocus its operations. A farewell message posted on the Ask.com homepage, reads: “Every great search must come to an end. As IAC continues to sharpen its focus, we have made the decision to discontinue our search business, which includes Ask.com.” The message thanked the engineers, designers, and teams who built the platform over the decades, as well as the users who relied on it. It closed with a short line: “Jeeves’ spirit endures.” What Ask Jeeves Was For anyone who came online after 2005 or so, Ask Jeeves might just be a name. But for users who first experienced the web in the late 1990s, Jeeves was something new. Garrett Gruener and David Warthen founded the company in Berkeley, California, in 1996. The service launched publicly as AskJeeves.com and introduced an idea that felt strange at the time.…