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As a technology reporter married to another tech reporter, I am in the (arguably) enviable position of seeing a steady stream of gadgets, Web sites and other digital effluvia. But while often I find much to appreciate in all this, rarely do I see a product I want to use myself.

This week, I saw such a product -- an innovative new search engine for opinions that promises to make a journalist's job a whole lot easier. Although media types may like Jodange LP's Top of Mind search engine, it is designed for public relations professionals, marketing directors, pollsters, politicians, policy makers and anyone else who needs to monitor opinions and opinion makers.

"Top of Mind lets you determine who's saying what about what," Jodange co-founder Larry Levy explains while demonstrating the technology. Top of Mind sifts through hundreds of thousands of documents that track the Fortune 1000 and S&P 500 (everything from annual financial reports to financial blogs) to ferret out opinions and the people who hold them.

Developed over the last decade by computer scientists at Cornell University, the search engine uses an approach known as "sentiment analytics," which involves making sense of both syntax and lexicon (meaning, identifying words, such as "reveal" and "anticipate," that indicate a subjective opinion). Targeting enterprises, Jodange's pricing starts at $5,000 per month to track 25 topics.

Levy and co-founder Claire Cardie, who is a computer science professor at Cornell, launched Jodange in March of last year and unveiled the search engine publicly last month at the influential Demo conference, where it was reviewed favorably. Conference organizer Chris Shipley calls Top of Mind "an engine worth noticing and one we think will generate much conversation." Jodange "mines and indexes opinions, allowing for an entirely new perspective on significant topics," she says. "How negative was Hillary Clinton the week of Nov. 17? How is the financial sector feeling about the oil industry these days? Jodange provides answers that were unattainable online, until now."

Since Demo, the company has introduced an online "gadget" aimed at professionals who want to track opinions about the most newsworthy companies in the S&P 500. The free program can be placed directly on a customized Google page, where it displays opinions published about the 10 most commented-upon companies. According to Levy, in the first 10 days, 4,500 people downloaded the Google gadget.

Levy, 42, is a repeat entrepreneur with a proven track record, having founded several companies including Semagix Group (sold to Warburg Pincus for an undisclosed sum in February 2006). Seed funding for Jodange came from Levy and angel investors, Canadian software entrepreneur Dennis Bennie and Denis O'Leary (previously CIO and head of Lab Morgan at J.P. Morgan Chase & Co.). Levy is currently looking to raise a $2 million to $3 million for a Series A round. - Mary Kathleen Flynn

See John R. Quain's Web site
See Dean Takahashi's Jan. 30 review

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