Category Archives: Social Implications

Universal Search is not Exploratory Search

In a recent response article, Danny Sullivan takes Forbes CEO Spanfeller to task on the whole Google vs. The Newspapers issue.  There are a lot of things I agree with Danny about, and an equal number of things that I … Continue reading

Posted in Exploratory Search, Social Implications | Leave a comment

Search Engine Rotation: Wolfram Alpha vs. Google

Apropos to my post yesterday, Technology Review has a short comparison of Wolfram Alpha and Google.  Here are a few samples: Here’s what I entered, and what I found. SEARCH TERM: Microsoft Apple WOLFRAM ALPHA: I got side-by-side tables and … Continue reading

Posted in Information Retrieval Foundations, Social Implications | Leave a comment

Do You Rotate Your Search Engine Usage?

It is good practice to rotate the mattress on your bed, to prevent lopsided wear-and-tear from shortening its useful life.  The same thing applies to car tires; they need rotating.  Smart travelers know to rotate the airlines from which they … Continue reading

Posted in General, Social Implications | 1 Comment

“Improving Findability” Falls Short of the Mark

Via Tim O’Reilly on Twitter, I came across this article by Vanessa Fox on how government can improve the findability of their web pages, and thereby allow citizens to become better informed and government to be more transparent.  Fox writes:

Posted in Exploratory Search, Social Implications | 3 Comments

Is the Ad-Sponsored Web Search Market a Conversation?

It has now officially been ten years since Christopher Locke, Doc Searls, and David Weinberger wrote the Cluetrain Manifesto, rekindling and reminding us of the centuries-old notion that markets are conversations between people, buyers and sellers. The following are a few … Continue reading

Posted in Explanatory Search, Social Implications | Leave a comment

Google Music China launches

Well, the move comes 9 years after I suggested it to ’em, but Google finally launches a music service: http://www.wired.com/techbiz/media/news/2009/03/reuters_us_google_china Now, my only question is whether they have simultaneously been researching and implementing intelligent search algorithms to go with the … Continue reading

Posted in Music IR, Social Implications | Leave a comment

Controversial Views and Web Search

Daniel Tunkelang continues to raise provocative and interesting questions over on his blog.  I would like to point readers to the comments section of a recent post.  In one of my own comments there, I raise a question about ad-supported … Continue reading

Posted in Information Retrieval Foundations, Social Implications | Leave a comment

Media Gatekeepers and Transparency

PBS has an interesting article on the new media gatekeepers and the need for transparency in the process by which they promote media.  Here is an excerpt: The problem for these new gatekeepers is that they are providing the old … Continue reading

Posted in Explanatory Search, Exploratory Search, Social Implications | 1 Comment

Social ?= Collaborative

There is an an interesting comment thread happening over on the FXPAL blog, about the differences between social search and collaborative search: http://palblog.fxpal.com/?p=350#comments

Posted in Collaborative Information Seeking, Social Implications | Leave a comment

Long Term versus Evolutionary Thinking (Part 2 of 2)

Continued from Part 1. Now that I’ve fully (perhaps too much so) explained the analogy that I will be using, I’d like to ground this discussion in the subject of information retrieval.  And I’ll start with an example that O’Reilly … Continue reading

Posted in General, Information Retrieval Foundations, Social Implications | 8 Comments