Although it doesn't literally pop off the screen, Ask.com hopes its new search display will have a figurative 3D effect on its users. The IAC-owned search engine unveiled a new three-panel search display it hopes will set it apart from vaunted rival Google.

Known as "Ask 3D," the new interface displays results over three vertical columns spread across the screen, doing away with a text-heavy list of links. While the first and second panels feature search information and more traditional results, the panel on the far right is devoted to photos and multimedia, or weather and clips from blogs, if the search does not lend itself to pictures.

"In some ways, we are becoming a convergence engine," said Jim Lanzone, Ask's CEO told the Washington Post. "We want to bring you the right information from the right source at the right time."

Although Ask is a distant fourth behind Google, Yahoo! and Microsoft in terms of search engine market share, Lanzone said the underdog position has one key advantage: the ability to take big risks.

"It gives us more of a license to experiment and, in this instance, the experiment yielded gold," he said.