Monthly Archives: November 2009

Lookup is to Exploratory Search as P is to NP

Daniel T. has an interesting bipartite use-case model for exploratory search: I know what I want, but I don’t know how to describe it. I don’t know what I want, but I hope to figure it out once I see … Continue reading

Posted in Exploratory Search, Information Retrieval Foundations | Leave a comment

The Tyranny of Simplicity, Redux

One of my ongoing research interest areas is in retrieval interfaces that allow more expressive and powerful statements of a user information need.  In that spirit, I wrote a minor rant last April about how the Apple iTunes smart playlist … Continue reading

Posted in Information Retrieval Foundations, Music IR | 1 Comment

More Information Is Positive

Via Greg Linden, I came across this interesting quote from Eric Schmidt about the obligation to help newspapers succeed: Finally, Eric claimed Google has a moral duty to help newspapers succeed: Google sees itself as trying to make the world … Continue reading

Posted in Explanatory Search, Social Implications | Leave a comment

The Craft of Storytelling

I’ve been playing around with some old TREC data over the past few days and completely by chance I came across this document.  I find it interesting because storytelling is a good metaphor for what we as researchers do when … Continue reading

Posted in Explanatory Search, General | Leave a comment

Good Interaction Design II: Just Ask

Last March I pointed out a short piece by Tessa Lau about how good interaction design trumps smart algorithms.  Today I have a followup.  In particular, Xavier Amatriain has a good writeup of the recently concluded Netflix contest.  Some of … Continue reading

Posted in Information Retrieval Foundations | 4 Comments

Tomorrow’s Data

Jeff Dalton recently wrote about why he doesn’t want your search log data.  It is an interesting read, and I recommend going through the whole article and comments.  But I want to call attention to one thought in particular: Academia … Continue reading

Posted in General | 7 Comments