ADVERTISEMENT



Google       

Home -> Law Blog Directory -> Intellectual Property Law Blogs -> SIVACRACY .NET

OR PHONE (866) 635-1838 for Bankruptcy Help, (866) 635-6190 for Divorce,
(866) 635-2689 for Personal Injury or (866) 635-9402 for Criminal Defense

Find a Local Lawyer

Bankruptcy (866) 635-1838
Divorce (866) 635-6190
Personal Injury (866) 635-2689
Criminal Defense (866) 635-9402

Bookmark

Intellectual Property Law

: SIVACRACY .NET

Google still offers really bad search results; Librarians still essential

By Siva Vaidhyanathan

ADVERTISEMENTS
The Chronicle: Librarians Find a Place in a 'Web 2.0' World With the success of Google, Wikipedia, and the various ventures that fall under the big tent of Web 2.0, it would be easy for researchers to feel that they?ve entered the era of do-it-yourself scholarly searching. But there are chinks in the armor of even the most sophisticated search engines and folksonomies, writes Thomas Mann, author of The Oxford Guide to Library Research. In a length essay (available online in PDF), Mr. Mann demonstrates how a fairly straightforward request for information ? in this case, a query on the system of tribute payments among Greek city-states during the Peloponnesian War ? can expose the shortcomings of Web searching. Google?s search engine can furnish a list of some 78,400 Web sites that include the terms ?Peloponnesian? and ?tribute,? and its Book Search service can find nearly 700 books containing the same words. But only a human guide or a classification system controlled by librarians can effectively sort the wheat from the chaff, Mr. Mann writes. Google ?hides the existence and the extent of relevant sources on most topics? by ?burying the good sources that it does find within massive and incomprehensible retrievals,? he says. Mr. Mann is not an anti-technology activist: He argues that much of the Web is well suited to the ?inexpensive indexing methods? used by Google and Web aggregators. But academic work is still grounded in books, not Web sites, and his essay is a reminder that scholars still benefit from librarians? ability to organize those books in a fashion that rigorous researchers will find useful. (Thanks to David Weinberger for the link.) ?Brock Read

Full post as published by SIVACRACY .NET on June 27, 2007 (boomark / email).

Bloggers, promote your law blog by nominating your blog for inclusion in USLaw.com's Law Blog Directory and RSS Reader. Benefits described.
Lawsuits and Settlements

ASMP and Other Visual Artists File Class Action Lawsuit Against Google
Google Faces Class Action for Copyright Infringement

TransUnion
Class action credit practices suit offers free credit monitoring services for millions.

Delayed Diagnosis Results in $1.1M Settlement
Delayed Diagnosis Results in $1.1M Settlement>

Strip Search Class Action Settled for $900,000
Strip Search Class Action Settled for $900,000

Strip-Search Lawsuit Settled for $1.1 Million
Strip-Search Lawsuit Settled for $1.1 Million

Google Sued for Violating the Privacy Rights of Millions of Americans
Google Sued for Violating the Privacy Rights of Millions of Americans

Related Searches

























































































































US Law
#1 Online Legal Resource













Your Blog Subscriptions
Subscribe to blogs

10,000+ Law Job Listings
Lawyer . Police . Paralegal . Etc
Earn a law-related degree
Are you the author of this blog? Adding USLaw.com to your Blogroll increases relevance. You qualify to display a USLaw Network badge.
Suggest changes to this blog's description or nominate another for inclusion. Register for updates.


Practice Area
Zip Code:

Contact a Lawyer Now!






0.0136 secs (new cache)