June 19, 2006
Google Does Shakespeare
Google launches new Shakespeare site, Reuters ( June 15)
"Web search leader Google on Wednesday launched a site devoted entirely to the Bard, http://www.google.com/shakespeare , that allows US users to browse through the full texts of his 37 plays. Readers can even plug in words, such as "to be or not to be" from "Hamlet," and immediately be taken to that part of the play.
The site, which was introduced in conjunction with Google's sponsorship of New York's "Shakespeare in the Park," also provides links to related scholarly research, internet groups, and even videos of theater performances of Shakespeare plays."
Ez2News New
ez2News - an alternative news search engine and portal, Pandia (June 12)
Reviews Ez2News , relative to Ez2find. It has 12,500 news sites and several news categories. However, there is no clear reason why one would use this over some of the main sources that turn up such as BBC or Google News.
New Look to Resourceshelf
Resourceshelf renewed, Pandia (June 14) - Comments about the new look to ResourceShelf , Gary Price's blog.
It does look better - colours are more current, and the font is more attractive - though this doesn't add up to being more readable. Also, as Pandia pointed outm it needs categories. Entries are being filed under uncategorized or military.
Also, I can't find a way to copy and paste the headline for each story - something that will make it much more time consuming to link to individual items.
The researcha advertisements, which weren't on the previous version, flash and move about in distracting ways.
The search facility is poor, as is often the case with blogs. Better to use Google site search.
Yahoo Local Maps Blog
New blog from Yahoo! covering maps and local search, Pandia (June
Yahoo has a new blog about maps and local search - Yahoo Local Maps Blog - "... Paul Levine of Yahoo! Local and Maps welcomes readers to the blog, arguing that “whether you’re a user, merchant, publisher or developer, if you’re interested in Local or Maps, this is the place for you.”"."
Google Earth Rollout
Google Earth: An Emerging 'Geobrowser' by Greg Sterling, Search Engine Watch Blog (June 13) - report on session at Google about the recent Google Earth rollout.
"Eric Schmidt, Larry Page and Sergey Brin introduced the session I attended and emphasized the importance of geography and location generally. Schmidt said, "Geolocation is one of the big opportunities around search." He pointed out that Google was "investing heavily in the 'core infrastructure': better maps, faster servers, more local context and data.""
US Real Estate Search
More Real Estate Search Engines & Sites, Search Engine Watch Blog ) June 16 - More US real estate search engines that SEW readers have recommended.
X1 Enterprise Client
X1 Offers Free Desktop Search for the Enterprise by Paula J. Hane, Information Today (June 19)
"The X1 Enterprise Client lets business users search their desktop e-mail, calendars, and documents, but the product’s features that could put corporate data at risk and adversely affect exchange and network performance have been disabled."
Mossberg on the Internet
The Current State of the Internet: Walt Mossberg at the Closing General Session, Don Hawkins, Information Today Blog (June 14)
Walt Mossberg, technology columnist for the Wall Street Journal, talked about Internet, PCs and phones at the SLA Conference in Baltimore.
Of interest: "Search has been a tremendous democratizing force because it has become the way most people approach the Internet. But progress in searching has stalled—there has not been any real discernable improvement in the accuracy of results. Although there has been improvement in presentation of results, search should focus more on actual answers instead of a list of links. The biggest problem with search today is that the emphasis has left improving the results for the consumer in favor of selling ads."
"Mossberg feels that there is a big need for researchers like information professionals that are skilled at plucking out what users need—someone who understands the context of the research, and who can look for patterns that make sense. Many corporate level executives don’t have time to do this, even if they might have the skills to do it."
Make Your Own Mashups
Where 2.0: New Sites Put Your Life on the Map - "Web sites let you personalize maps to share the times and places of your life." Dennis O'Reilly, PC World (June 14)
Five personal mapping sites - Wayfaring.com, Platial.com, 43places.com, Plazes.com, and Flagr.com. O'Reilly thinks that Platial , which dubs itself "The People's Atlas", has the most stickiness. It's easy to browse and international in scope.
CBC.CA Ten Years
CBC clicks online by Tara Perkins, Toronto Star (June 19)
CBC.ca is Canada's most visited website according to figures from comScore in this article. Sue Gardner, head of CBC's website, at a celebration of the 10th year of this site said, ""We have 160 people working for the website. We have 750,000-plus pages of material online. ... Over the years, I think we've won every major award out there. ... Our audience over the past year has increased 60 per cent ... and we are the Number 1 news media website in Canada since December, and still holding steady at the Number 1 spot ..." Costs are between $10 and $20 million.
Because of the cost of buying rights to material CBC doesn't own, podcasts may be incomplete (without a theme song) and shows may not be archived. CBC will be adding more clips but not necessarily with the context or writing that has been true with existing archives.
There is some mention of difficulties in producing podcasts and archiving material.
June 16, 2006
Blow to Net Neutrality
House rejects Net neutrality rules by Declan McCullagh, CNet (June 8)
The U.S. House of Representatives rejected " a Democrat-backed amendment that would have enshrined stiff Net neutrality regulations into federal law and prevented broadband providers from treating some Internet sites differently from others."
Guess the telecom lobby won to be free of restrictions - now they can charge to deliver content or block sites.
Netscape Goes Social Media
AOL Tries to Revive Netscape.com with Digg-Like Content By Pamela Parker, Clickz (June 15, 2006 )
"In a bid to win more audience to bolster its new advertising-focused strategy, AOL is re-launching Netscape.com as a collaborative news site, much like the popular Digg.com. The beta site launched late last night in advance of a July 1 official debut."
News stories and videos will be submitted by users but there will be an editorial staff. Users will vote and network with others (one presumes). The aim is to attract a more mainstream audience of users rather than tech-centric and early adopter. Hmm- is the mainstream audience ready for this?
Google US Government Search
Google launched Google U.S. Government Search for searching U.S. government Internet sites - http://usgov.google.com. It is an index of federal, state and local sites in the .gov or .mil domains along with selected sites from domains for us, edu and com. The announcement stated that this is meant "to help government workers who need to search for information from more than one agency".
ResourceShelf looked at it and found it very similar in content to the older Google Uncle Sam but richer in features such a personalization and documentation. Content on their searches of the two was identical.
In any event Google Uncle Sam is gone and Google U.S. Government Search is here.
Google's New USGov.Google vs Google Uncle Sam, ResourceShelf (June 15)
Google to launch government search service -- report By Christopher Noble, Marketwatch (June 15)
June 15, 2006
Image Searching
An Alternative Interface to Google’s Image Search, ResearchBuzz (June 14) - Imagery is an alternative way to search Google's images. Works with Firefox 1.5.
June 14, 2006
Search Behaviour Statistics
Understanding Searcher Behavior by Grant Crowell, SearchDay (June 14) - This was written for people in search marketing, but it's always interesting to learn more about search practices.
Kelsey Research found that -
+ 35% of online shoppers are loyal to one engine
+ 53% use 2 or 3 engines
+ 10% use more than 4 engines regularly
+ " 54% of search users have substituted Internet/search for the phone book, mostly for specific local lookups. Local is growing faster than general web search.""
Google Photos Coming
Google does a Flickr -- 'My Picasa is your Picasa' By Elinor Mills, Silicon.com (June 14)
Google is adding online storage and photo sharing a la Flickr to Picasa, its photo management software. Initially this will be available only to GMail account holders by invitation. http://picasaweb.google.com
"Picasa Web Album is designed to let people easily upload and store their photos online. Uploaded albums can be public and available to anyone who knows the Gmail account under which they're listed, or private ("unlisted") and available only by way of a special link Picasa users can send to whomever they wish."
Sounds great but the shutterbug has much to choose from. Yahoo has a new photos site (photos.yahoo.com), and of course there is Flickr, plus numerous sites by the camera makers.
But Google's will surely be popular. Time for everyone to apply for a GMail account just to take advantage of these other services.
June 13, 2006
Google Shortcut for Time
Enter time in Toronto into the Google search box and Google will tell you. I've done this for years and got an answer from other sources. Now Google delivers the time instantly.
Real Estate Verticals
A Real Estate Vertical Search Roundup, Part 2 by Greg Sterling, SearchDay (June 13) -- Roundup of popular real estate search verticals in the United States.
Usenet Death Knoll
CYBERIA: Usenet's death revisited by Jack Kapica, Globe and Mail (June 12)
Bell Sympatico dropped access to Usenet newsgroups on June 6 without warning and with next to no notice. The alternative they proposed at NewHosting.com doesn't work 3 days a week, although perhaps the premium service at $285 / year is better. Rogers closed its use of Usenet last December.
This confirms my view that the grassroots community activity that used to take place in newsgroups is finding other venues in the social networking centres and places like Yahoo Answers and of course Google and Yahoo Groups. It's not a complete match in function, but newsgroups had become run-down and loosing users.
Google Earth
Google upgrades mapping tools by Michael Liedtke, AP via Yahoo News (June 12)
Google Earth will cover more of the planet - "four times more land will be covered in the latest version of its free Google Earth software, enabling about one-third of the world's population to obtain an aerial view of their homes and neighborhood."
It's also available in German, Spanish, French and Italian.
Internet Detective is Back
Internet Detective is back and we're glad.
"Internet Detective, a free online tutorial designed to help students
develop the critical thinking required for their Internet research, is
being launched on the Web on June 13th in the RDN Virtual Training Suite
at: http://www.vts.intute.ac.uk/detective/
This tutorial is directed to new university students of all subjects, but will be useful to everyone who is using the Internet for academic research where evaluating quality of information is especially important.
This is a British project, "developed by staff from ILRT at the University of Bristol and the Manchester Metropolitan University "
June 12, 2006
Flock
Revamping the Web Browser "Surfing the Web has meant using much the same technology for years. Now startups are working on new ways to navigate the Net." By Wade Roush, Technology Review (June 12) - The browser as we have known it may be passe. New, more versatile applications are being developed to support what people do on the Web now. This article mentions Browster for some previews of where a link is going, and Flock for more integrated function. ".... Flock's developers believe that integrating them will provide a better user experience. "We're building the next-generation web browser," says Andrews. "We're going to exceed what people are used to with Internet Explorer and Firefox right now, by integrating these services and reducing the complexity of simple tasks, say, uploading photos to Flickr or adding images to your MySpace page.""
June 10, 2006
Details on Google Browser Sync for Firefox
First impressions of Google Browser Sync by Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols, Desktop Linux.com (June 8) - Details on the Google Browser Sync for Firefox - the advantages, options, and cautionary notes.
"Browser Sync is a Firefox-specific extension that synchronizes your browser settings across computers. Specifically, you can use it to have one common set of Web page history files, persistent cookies, saved passwords, and -- the real deal as far as I'm concerned -- your bookmarks."
June 09, 2006
Image Search by Pattern
retrievr: Image Search by Color and Pattern, Greg Notess, SearchEngineShowdown (June 5) - about Retrievr, an experimental image search engine for finding images that are similar in colour or pattern.
TechXtra for engineering, mathematics and computing information
For people interested in engineering, computing or mathematics, TechXtra may be a godsend. This has articles, key websites, books, the latest industry news, job announcements, ejournals, eprints, technical reports, the latest research and more!
From the news release:
Database Cross-Search
This searches over 4 million items from 25 different databases. Use this to find articles, key websites, theses and dissertations, books, industry news, new job announcements, technical reports, eprints, learning & teaching resources and the latest research in engineering, mathematics and computing.Sources include: Australian Research Repositories Online to the World, arXive (eprint archive in computer science, maths and related subjects), CiteSeer (research articles in computer science), Directory of Open Access Journals, ePrints UK (selected open archives in the UK), Copac (union catalogue from the Consortium of University Research Libraries), National Engineering Education Delivery System (digital library of learning resources), NASA Technical Reports (12 different NASA technical report series)... plus 18 other databases. Details are available at: http://www.techxtra.ac.uk/index.html?action=collectiondetails More databases will be added in the near future.
Searchforvideo has new homepage
Searchforvideo.com Launches New Design and Popular Category Zones, Business Wire via Marketwatch (June 8)
"Searchforvideo.com is an online video search portal that aggregates freely available video links from over 6000 public sources.
The new homepage design is intended to make it easier for users to discover and view free online video selections from automated software agents and human editors. As part of the new site design, there are several new category sections that highlight and recommend videos for users. Some sections are updated daily while some are updated hourly depending on the popularity amongst users. "
Ingenta Connect
Ingenta Signs Publishers to IngentaConnect Platform Econtent (Jun 9)
"Ingenta, a provider that connects the publishing and information industries, has announced the latest 13 publishers to add their journals to the IngentaConnect platform, which provides subscription and pay-per-view access to nearly 10,000 scholarly ejournals."
Windows Live Instant Answers
Windows Live Search Adds Instant Answers By Nathan Weinberg, Microsoft Blognewschannel (June 8)
Windows Live has instant answers for news and local search. So - you'll see them if you put in Iraq (of course) or pizza new york.
Yahoo Answers On A Roll
Look Out Wikipedia, Here Comes Yahoo Answers! by Danny Sulllivan, SearchDay (June 8)
Yahoo Answers has 10 million answers! Danny Sullivan has other figures that show that Yahoo Answers has experienced stunning growth in the last four months, so much so that it ranks as third in the Hitwise category for Education / Reference after Wikipedia and Dictionary.com and ahead of the excellent Answers.com. Sullivan thinks that being in the game is part of the attraction in answering questions at Yahoo i- it's a competition. It is also and most notably a place for discussion.
Sullivan expects that the answer sites will get new energy - "Aside from hearing more about Yahoo Answers, expect you'll likely see a revitalization of answer search in general. MSN's already got one in beta. Answerbag just popped up on my radar and will have new features later this month." My sense from reviewing several such as Wondir, and seeing the decline of Allexperts.com, was that these were waning or becoming more irrelevant. But I guess Yahoo Answers has a new energy. I still think this is a playground, not a place for serious research (unless it is of the sociological kind).
Google Browser Sync for Firefox
Google Develops Browser Sync Tool for Firefox by Juan Carlos Perez, PC World via Yahoo News (June 8)
"Google has created a tool that lets users synchronize the settings of their Firefox browsers across multiple computers."
"With Google Browser Sync, users will maintain the same bookmarks, Web site visits log, saved passwords, and persistent cookies in all their copies of the Mozilla open-source browser."
Works for me - http://www.google.com/tools/firefox/browsersync/index.html
Firefox Plugins
Best Firefox plug-ins for work by Rafe Needleman, CNet Reviews (June 7)
Four great plugins for Firefox to make browsing more pleasant. Browster for previewing a link, Tab preview for seeing what's there, Tabbrowser preferences for faster closing, Jeteye for bookmark sharing, and Stumbleupon for serendipity. Wonderful.
June 08, 2006
Advanced SearchBar
New Internet Technology Challenges Google Toolbar Dominance Feature-packed Online Tool Puts Best of the Internet at User's Fingertips, PRNewswire via Marketwatch (June 7)
"The Advanced Searchbar located at http://www.advancedsearchbar.com , places the best of the Internet directly at the users' fingertips, providing users with more features than the Google and Yahoo! toolbars combined. Offering the ability to search the Internet using over 100 different search engines, the Advanced Searchbar combines the functionality of different Internet searching tools with the ease-of-use and convenience of a one-click online remote control, creating a unique, all- inclusive toolbar that is considered a digital "Swiss Army Knife.""
Certainly has a lot - maybe too much. There are several search engines you may not want on your list. Firefox users may prefer to stick with adding individual search engines to the browser.
Info.com adds Answers
Info.com Partners With Answers.com Adding Reference Vertical Search to Robust Search Platform; Partnership Enhances Info.com's Value Proposition of Delivering Comprehensive and Quality Information Business Wire via Marketwatch (June 7)
"Info.com, a search platform for broad-web and vertical search engines, today announced a partnership with Answers.com, the leading Internet encyclopedic reference site dedicated to delivering answers covering over 3 million topics."
Eurekster and Swickis
Letting the community guide your search [Video] "Eurekster founder and CEO Steven Marder tells Bambi Francisco how community-based search engines differ from general search engines like Google, Yahoo, MSN and Ask.com." Marketwatch (June 7)
Example is drawn for Popular Science's use of Eurekster community search. Search results do differ according to where you search. For example, if you are searching Popular Science you'll get an article not a web site. The community "collaborates passively" finding other content and recommending through use.
Publishers (including blog publishers) can put swickis on their site. There are over 10,000 swickis today in over 13 countries.
June 07, 2006
US Real Estate Search
A Real Estate Vertical Search Roundup, Part 1 by Greg Sterling, SearchDay (June 7)
US housing market is hot online -- "If you thought the housing market was competitive, try online real estate sites. After a couple of years of seeming stability and calm, the sector is now booming with new startups offering everything from estimates on the value of your house (and your neighbors) to discounts on broker commissions and ratings and reviews of local sellers' agents."
Net Neutrality?
Craigslist is being blocked by Cox Interactive - is this a net neutrality issue? By Tom Foremski for Silicon Valley Watcher (June 6)
People using the COX cable network can't see Craigslist, the classified ads centre. Might this be because COX has its own classifieds? Is this indicative of what happens when the cable company or telco controls access to services?
More suits against Google
French Lawsuit Over Google Book Search, SEW Blog (June 6)- Everyone is suing Google over the book digitizing project: French publishers and now the All Party Internet Group, an independent British parliamentary organization. Perception is everything - and in this case, Google is seen as the villain.
Flashblock Firefox Extension
Hate Flash Ads? Try Flashblock for Firefox by Amy Gahran, Poynter Online (June 6)
Annoyed with those Flash ads that cover the article you are trying to read? There is a new Firefox extension called FlashBlock which will block the ad but give you the option to download view.
Flashblock is at http://flashblock.mozdev.org/
User-Generated Brochures
Google, the Web, and the wikis:
Commentary: Creating user-generated brochures by Bambi Francisco, Marketwatch (June 6)
Interesting point of view - Google, Yahoo and others are making it possible for everyman to participate in building knowledge. This, as Francisco, is how the Oxford English Dictionary was created in the 1800s, but she doesn't mention that the OED had the leadership of a supreme editor, James Murray and next Henry Bradley.
" From Google's Co-op to Yahoo's MyWeb to startup services from Squidoo, ShopWiki, WikiOutdoors and others, the foundations are being laid for online guides that cover the most common interests and the most obscure ones.
In effect, Google, Yahoo and the others, are trying to fuse together the user-generated Wikipedia model, the expert-driven About.com model and the social-networking model of News Corp.'s MySpace.com.
Whether all of this turns out to be the next growth engine for online advertising remains to be seen, but the end results are beginning to remind me of that most prosaic advertising vehicle, the brochure."
June 06, 2006
Yahoo MyWeb Face Lift
Yahoo MyWeb2 has new colours, new layout, and a new name - MyWeb. Shows top tags, tag cloud for community, and a list of "interesting today" - which surprisingly were actually interesting.
It seems better organized too. Layout is more intuitive - my bookmarks, my contacts, and interesting today. Search of MyWeb will show all results, my results, everyone's results.
Top tags run across the top, and there is a tag finder in the left panel above the cloud. Look for book reviews to get pages tagged with that phrase, a list of people who use that tag, and related tags - such as books, book.reviews, book suggestions etc.
A "did you know" box gives tips on using this improved MyWeb.
Yahoo MyWeb Gets New Look, Easier Browsing & Viewing Features by Danny SUllivan, SearchDay (June 6) - reviews history of MyWeb and identifies the changes.
"Yahoo's given its MyWeb bookmarking service a new look and new features, making it easier than before for people to find what others are saving and sharing on the service."
Accident Mashup
Google Earth for accidents? by Ryan Reiterman, The Advertiser - Tribune (June 5)
Here's an innovative mashup using Google Earth and accident data. The Ohio State Highway Patrol is using Google Earth to show where fatal accidents occurred in 2005 combined with with information about the crash - kind of car, factors.
Google Spreadsheet
Google adds spreadsheet to its growing list of applications. Could be a great way to work on a spreadsheet with others. This is a limited test at this time - you have to apply for an invitation.
Google spreadsheet in the works, by Dan Farber, ZDNet Blog (June 5)
"The Wall Street Journal by way The Guardian is reporting that Google plans to add a speadsheet to its set of applications, that also include Writely, Google Base, Google Mail."
Related article - Google Spreadsheets turns up heat on Excel by Elinor Mills, ZDnet -- "Google is set to launch on Tuesday a Web-based spreadsheet program that will allow people to view and simultaneously edit data while conducting "in-document" chat, a company product manager said Monday."
June 05, 2006
Fortune finds Ask.com
Ask.com: Google's up-and-coming rival -- "Search is evolving. Ask.com has features others lack. Don't let habit prevent you from trying something new." -- David Kirkpatrick, Fortune (June 3)
Fortune likes Ask.com a lot.
"Type a typical search into Ask.com - for instance "Global warming." On top of the results page is a link to a Wikipedia entry on the subject - along with a tiny chart showing rising global temperatures. Immediately below are links to two news stories on global warming.
Only then do you see ads - and just three. Below them, Ask lists the EPA's Web site, and next to that entry a little icon of binoculars. If you move your cursor over it, a miniature version of the EPA page pops up. Most of the other links on the results page also offer binocular screens. At the bottom of the page are five more ads."
Corporate Web 2.0
Web 2.0 Has Corporate America Spinning -- What every CEO needs to know about the array of new tools that foster online collaboration -- and could revolutionize business -- by Robert Hof, Business Week ONline (June 5)
Finding authoritative blog content
Ask.com's Blog & Feed Search Joins the Blogosphere by Barbara Quint, Newsbreaks (June 5)
Reviews have been very good about the new blogsearch from Ask - http://blogsearch.ask.com.
"The relevancy ranking impact of Bloglines could turn out to be a critical advantage for Ask.com's Blog & Feed Search service. Other popular blog search engines have been trying to help searchers reach more authoritative content. For example, Google Blog Search tops the results page with generic recommendations for blogging sites. Yahoo! distinguishes authoritative news blogs by including specific blogs in its Yahoo! News section. Technorati lets bloggers label their blogs with broad categories, while users can sort content by frequency of links by other bloggers or even confine searches to favorite sites. Bloglines is already in position to have that kind of user flow in place on a broad level. Hundreds of thousands of Bloglines users indicate their preferences through searches, subscriptions, clippings, and sharing activities."
YouTube Channels
YouTube channeling its users, by Andrew Wallenstein, Reuters via Yahoo News (June 5)
"YouTube's members are now able to become their own channels -- though not in the traditional definition of the word. Instead of providing a linear video feed, a YouTube channel allows a member to aggregate programming of their own creation or offer a collection of programs from other sources. The change will encourage the formation of communities around successful channels, be they content creators or collectors."
"YouTube registers 50 million views and 50,000 video uploads each day." WOW
RDN Progress Report
People at the Resource Discovery Network have issued a progress report on the transformation of RDN to Intute, essentially an integration of the 8 hubs. The Intute mission is to "advance education and research by promoting the best of the Web, through evaluation and collaboration".
The public launch will be on July 13 in London. The group will also be running several seminars in the UK on using the Internet for education starting in September - sounds like these will take place in rooms rather than virtually but perhaps an online version will emerge from this.
The full report is titled - The transition to Intute - Update from the Resource Discovery Network.
June 03, 2006
E&P Awards 2006
UPDATE: 'E&P' Announces 2006 EPpy Awards Winners (May 22)
"In the category of Best Overall Newspaper-Affiliated Internet Service with more than 1 million unique monthly visitors, Washingtonpost.com took top honors. In the category of Best Overall Newspaper-Affiliated Internet Service under 1 million unique monthly visitors, the Roanoke.com was the winner."
Exploratory Search
Exploratory Search Interfaces: Categorization, Clustering and Beyond -- "
Report on the XSI 2005 Workshop at the Human-Computer Interaction Laboratory, University of Maryland"
"Search engines, bibliographic databases and digital libraries provide adequate support for users whose information needs are well-defined. However, they do not work well in situations where users lack the knowledge or contextual awareness to formulate queries or navigate complex information spaces. ... In situations where information needs are vague or evolving users generally have developed coping strategies to compensate [1,2,5]. For example, they submit a tentative query that retrieves documents and browse from there, dependent solely on their ability to interpret contextual cues and navigate between documents. In short, they explore available information, selectively seeking and passively obtaining cues about where next steps lie. The goal of information exploration is the refinement of a vague information need that leads, through interaction with information objects and information resources, to a more thorough understanding of the problem. Searchers may benefit from interfaces that provide additional support, for example by enabling grouping of results and/or guided discovery processes [3,4,6]. Researchers from communities such as information retrieval, user interface design, visualization and library sciences have been working for some time on techniques to support such exploratory searches."
Weather Answers at Ask
Ask.com's Seven Day Forecast Smart Answer, Resourceshelf (May 21) -- weather and climate info through Ask's Smart Answers.
The most useful to Canadians will be
Amazon's New Book Reader
Amazon.com's Search Inside the Book Gets a New Look with New AmazonOnlineReader and Your Media Library, ResourceShelf (May 22)
Amazon has a new online reader for Search Inside the Book. ResourceSHelf has clear instructions on how to find it and use it, and a few book titles you can try.
Desktop - So What?
In Search of Search? by Jim Rapoza, eWeek (May 29)
A sane word about desktop search -- "So, while desktop search tools are nice, they aren't really big news. It would be big news if companies such as Microsoft made it easier for content to be properly tagged and categorized as it's created, making these processes natural and easy, as opposed to difficult and unintuitive."
Social Search in China at Baidu
The Baidu way to search -- Commentary: Learning to surf the Web from China , by Bambi Francisco, Marketwatch (June 1)
"Baidu has its main search engine with a clean interface, but it also has Baidu Knows and Baidu Postbar, and a newly-formed Baidu-pedia (a Wikipedia in Chinese).
These three services -- accessed via tabs on the Baidu search home page -- are community-oriented. They serve to keep Chinese Internet users drawn to other people using Baidu, according to Li, who recently sat down with me at the Four Seasons Hotel in San Francisco. In many ways, Baidu is perceived as a community or social network, not just a search engine. "
Fun with Google
55 Ways to have fun with Google, Googling Google (June 1)
New book about using Google - 55 Ways to Have Fun with Google by Philipp Lenssen of Google Blogoscoped.
New Yahoo Video
Yahoo introduces improved video service -- "New Yahoo site makes it easier for Web users to find and share videos", Infoworld (June 1)
"The site builds on Yahoo's existing video search capability and will compete with video search services from Google, AOL, Microsoft's MSN, and other video-sharing sites like YouTube.com and MySpace.com.
Visitors to video.yahoo.com can store their favorite videos, browse based on category, and upload their own videos to the site. Site visitors can review and rate videos and also embed the Yahoo Video player in their own Web sites or blogs to share videos. "
Also described in detail in ResourceShelf -- Web Search - Yahoo (May 31)
Google Video Movie Trailers
Google Video: At the Movies by Ian Schafer, CLickz (June 2)
"Recently, Google launched Google Video Movie Previews, a destination for audiences to watch trailers for films that are in theaters or coming soon. Though it hasn't exactly reinvented the way audiences find movie trailers online, there are aspects that bode well for this product's future, as well as some elements that could probably use improvement."
Kosmix gets PC World Award
Kosmix Wins 2006 World Class Award From PC World, Business Wire via Marketwatch (June 1)
"Kosmix was honored in the Search Engine category by PC World with a 2006 World Class Award ...
Kosmix offers the first fundamental innovation in core search technology in years. Based on sophisticated algorithms, Kosmix presents a multi-dimensional view of search results that enables consumers to search less, while finding the most useful information on the Web more easily. Kosmix has applied its new search technology to several key market segments, including Health, Travel, Video Games, Finance and U.S. Politics ( www.kosmix.com). "
Google Payment System
On-line payments next on Google's to-do list, by Mathew Ingram, Globe and Mail (June 3)
"At the moment, when you click to buy something through Google Video or the Google Store, you have to sign an agreement with Google Payment Corp. -- a company the search engine giant set up last fall. Going to "purchases.google.com" brings you to a login screen for your Google account, and the site then presents you with a list of all the videos and other items you've bought.
In other words, the structure is already there to support a whole range of purchasing. And while it is still early days for Google Base, the service has already been used by car dealers and real estate agents as a classifieds-style service, one that allows companies to upload their own database of items (hence the name Base) relatively easily. This could put the service squarely in the same camp as eBay, and appeal to that company's core market of "power sellers.""
300,000 Free E-Books
Groups to give free access to on-line books, Globe and Mail (June 3)
"Project Gutenberg and World eBook Library plan to make "a third of a million" e-books available free for a month at the first nameWorld eBook Fair. Downloads will be available at the fair's website from July 4, the 35th anniversary of Project Gutenberg's founding, through Aug. 4.
The majority of the books will be contributed by the World eBook Library. It otherwise charges $8.95 a year for access to its database of more than 250,000 e-books, documents and articles."
June 01, 2006
About OPACs
Library Search Tools Don't Stack Up, Genie Tyburski, TVC ALert (June 1) - Summary of a three-part article by Karen G. Schneider on what is wrong with search tools for library catalogs. The article is at ALA Tech Source, Schneider's blog -- How OPACs Suck.
YouTube Video Spreads
Yahoo Video to compete with Google and YouTube, By Chris Nuttall, FT.com via MSNBC (June 1)
"Yahoo is taking on Google and start-up YouTube with a service that allows users to upload and share their videos."
Update on what these three are doing. Probably good for 1 week.
Bharat of Google News
Google News inventor defends aggregator site, by Martin Stabe, Online Press Gazette (June 1)
Profiles Krishna Bharat, inventor of Google News.
""Google News makes it possible — makes it trivial, actually — to read news from multiple points of view on any given issue, and when I see that happening, I feel that we have succeeded," he says."
Has several interesting bits on how Google News works. It is now searching about 10,000 sites (not 4,500) and in all the languages supported by Google News. There is often controversy over what Google News includes or excludes. That it has press releases does not please everyone.
Plans for Wikis
Wikis Offer Promise and Peril by Reid Goldsborough, LinkUp Digital (June 1)
Mainly about Wikipedia and related controversy, but does have some bits about other wikis including --
"Digital Universe (http://www.digitaluniverse.net) is planning to launch Encyclopedia of the Earth, which it’s positioning as a Wikipedia alternative and “the PBS of the Web.” Still in the beta stage, it intends to become “the largest reliable public information resource in history.”"
Also mentions -- Information Technology Toolbox, Inc. (http://www.ittoolbox.com) wiki on information technology; and TechRepublic (http://www.techrepublic.com) work through a wiki to get IT industry experts.
Be Careful What You Search For
U.S. asks Internet firms to save data, by on Swartz and Kevin Johnson, USA TODAY (June 1)
"Top law enforcement officials have asked leading Internet companies to keep histories of the activities of Web users for up to two years to assist in criminal investigations of child pornography and terrorism, the Justice Department said Wednesday."
Ask.com Blog Search
New Ask.com blog search and Bloglines upgrade (but no new UI), Read/Write Web (May 31)
Sounds like the blog search has become a collaborative social effort - "In essence they're saying that Bloglines users tell the engine what is the best content. Ask.com is also applying their search algorithm on top of the Bloglines subscription data. Users can then filter their results."
The new Ask blog search is at http://www.ask.com/?tool=bls
See review by Chris Sherman, Ask Debuts Blog & Feed Search (June 1) -- "Ask's new blog and feed search offers a high-quality alternative for finding information in the blogosphere, with a number of unique tools not found on competing services."
Comprehensive review by Gary Price -- Ask.com Launches Blog & Feed Search Service - Resourceshelf (June 1)