The disclosed technique, apparatuses and devices enable a mobile device to act as a pointing device equipped with integrated search tools, to define a virtual beam within which to search and discover information associated therewith. The user of the mobile device does not have to type, speak or otherwise specify keywords as search criteria. The search criteria can be merely the virtual beam itself. Search results are generated at a remote server system and communicated back to the mobile device, and then presented to its user via graphical, audio and/or other format.