FreePint Newsletter 236 - Internet Advertising + Search Trails > = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = ** Choose your FreePint format: HTML for on-screen reading; PDF for printing or emailing ** Change your subscription options at any time: View current and back issues online: > = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = FreePint "Helping 79,000 people find, use, manage and share work-related information" ISSN 1460-7239 30th August 2007 No.236 > = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = ONLINE FORMATTED HTML VERSION IN THIS ISSUE ------------- EDITORIAL By Monique Cuvelier, Editor, FreePint MY FAVOURITE TIPPLES By Tim Buckley-Owen FREEPINT BAR In Association with Factiva, from Dow Jones JINFO :: JOBS IN INFORMATION Assistant Librarian Central London Pre Lib/Graduate Information Assistant Business Information Librarian Head of Shared Understanding / Knowledge Manager Research Consultant Researcher Information Manager Manager and Head, Library and Archives Information Management Analyst Corporate Knowledge Manager Subscription co-ordinator Information and Training Assistant TIPS ARTICLE "A Primer: The Wonderful World of Internet Advertising" By David Sarokin REVIEW "The Virtual Reference Handbook: Interview and Information Delivery Techniques for the Chat and E-mail Environments" Written by Diane Kovacs Reviewed by Laura Suttell FEATURE ARTICLE "Search Trails: Back to the Future" By Nigel Hamilton EVENTS, GOLD AND FORTHCOMING ARTICLES CONTACT INFORMATION ONLINE FORMATTED HTML VERSION FULLY FORMATTED PDF VERSION > = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = ** Analyst Research, Securities Filings and Company Docs ** August's VIP provides in-depth reviews of products from Northern Light, 10-K Wizard and D&B, plus analysis of the news. Purchase the issue, or subscribe today: Request a sample issue, and evaluate VIP for your professional library: > = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = *** ABOUT FREEPINT *** FreePint is a global network of people who find, use, manage and share work-related information. Members receive this free twice-monthly newsletter, which is packed with tips, features and resources. Joining FreePint is free at and connects information practitioners around the world with resources, events and answers to their tricky research and information questions at the FreePint Bar, our free online forum: . Please share FreePint with others by forwarding this message. The FreePint Newsletter is available online in several formats and can be read, saved and forwarded at . > = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = EDITORIAL By Monique Cuvelier, Editor, FreePint One of my favourite hobbies is scanning magazines, newspapers and the things people say for cultural themes. It's an occupational hazard of being a journalist. For years I've noticed Americans are absorbed with a 'spoil yourself' mentality, a trait I'm certain has led to expanding waistlines and the proliferation of beauty spas. Recently I've seen a curious word crop up again and again: 'obsession'. It's appeared in movie titles, book titles, headlines and radio shows, and nobody seems embarrassed by it. Doctors used to prescribe Prozac to cure obsessions, but now it's a freely embraced and nurtured state of mind. You're allowed to be obsessed with Japanese anime, food, Vespa scooters or Viggo Mortensen. We've all come to love grasping a notion and focusing on it to the point of worship. When obsessions control your behaviour, it can be a bad thing, such as when you're washing your hands every five minutes or stalking poor Viggo. But obsessions also create exploration and innovation. Little ideas can become big movements when they become fixations. For information professionals, search is an obsession. It hurts when you spend too long hunting for information you can't find (see my Bar posting on how to measure the amount of information online). But it can also spark new ideas, such as Trexy's technology that uses the search patterns of others to create useful paths of information, which Nigel Hamilton reports on. Or new opportunities, such as search-driven advertising tools from Google, Yahoo! and MSN, which our frequent contributor David Sarokin covers. Laura Suttell nurses her own obsession with books by reviewing "The Virtual Reference Handbook". What are your obsessions? I'd love to know, and if it seems like a shared obsession, we'll cover it here. Sincerely, Monique Cuvelier Editor, FreePint e: monique.cuvelier@freepint.com w: FreePint is a Registered Trademark of Free Pint Limited (R) 1997-2007 > = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = *** NEW: Project Handbook Report and Tool Kit *** Create documentation for project success Author Stephanie Taylor puts her popular workshop in workbook format: Understand users, write clear step-by-step guides and gather feedback to make your project handbook as useful as possible. Includes 7 hands- on worksheets Instant online access with credit card purchase: > = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = On the Ticker: Use DocuTicker for Full-Text Resources Find free full-text reports put out by government agencies, NGOs, charities and other public interest organisations. Recent additions: * The Latin American Community in Canada * New Report: Who's Still Smoking [in NYC] New! DocuTicker is getting its *own* newsletter, starting in September. Subscribe today: > = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = MY FAVOURITE TIPPLES By Tim Buckley-Owen Here's a confession: my favourite Tipple by far is a printed one: The Economist magazine. It's great to sit in the pub, with a real tipple to hand, leafing through its pages, relishing the writing, frequently disagreeing with its views, but always enjoying the serendipity - far better than focusing on just a handful of stories selected online. However, there are a few sites to which I constantly return, looking for good material for stories and features. * OUT-LAW from law firm Pinsent Masens has 7000 pages of free legal news and guidance, updated regularly. It takes in IT as well as a range of associated information developments. * Although I can never afford to buy their reports, another site I can't afford to ignore is Outsell . It incorporates the UK-based EPS, bringing together the two key research and consultancy firms for the information industry. * Provocative, iconoclastic and sometimes infuriating, The Register is a good read and a rich source of leads. 'Biting the hand that feeds IT' is its strapline, as well as other information-related hands as well. * ContentBlogger , from publishing consultancy Shore Communications Inc, reproduces vast quantities of news and commentary on electronic and print publishing from a prodigious range of (mostly US) sources - plenty of it of interest to info pros. * The Chartered Institute of Library & Information Professionals' weekly e-bulletin is great for the big-picture approach on what the UK media are saying about information issues. Membership required. > - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Tim Buckley Owen is an independent information industry commentator who writes for a range of library and information publications and runs practical training courses on information skills . > = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = > = = = = = = = = = = = = = ADVERTISEMENT = = = = = = = = = = = = = = ** Learn the Art of Successful eNewsletters ** in a Free Webcast from Dow Jones' InfoPro Alliance Join Mary Ellen Bates on 6th September at 11.00am US EST as she shares highlights from her new eBook, The Art of E-Newsletters. Register now at > = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =[FA1236] ResourceShelf Resource of the Week: IssueLab Explore the latest posts in mobile search, search engine news, podcasting and more. Latest Searcher's Guide features outstanding collections in wireless web, mashups and dashboards, ebooks and more: Visit > = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = FREEPINT BAR By Monique Cuvelier, Editor, FreePint In Association with Factiva, from Dow Jones From the conference equivalent to movies at Cannes to a simple yet perplexing question about the amount of information online, the FreePint Bar is humming with ideas and suggestions. Read summaries below and then hop over to to join in the fun. * Cannes is known for its film festival, but is any place in Britain known for its conferences? One FreePint Bar member is wondering what the de rigueur place is for hosting large-scale conferences. Birmingham pops up a couple times in the discussion, as do Manchester and London. Where do you go for UK-based events? . * Age and librarianship is a common topic in the FP Bar, and a 'mature' student librarian relocating from Europe to Newcastle is wondering how she can go about finding a job. Of course, she can start by combing the listings on Jinfo , but many others have additional ideas. Check them out: . * Look at a related conversation about how to find regional organizations or networking opportunities in the Midlands . * Yes, the FreePint crew needs research help sometimes, even your humble editor. When I asked a perplexing question - how much information is there online? - I received several helpful leads for more research. See what gems this line of questioning dug up: . * One 'Pinter is looking for help with Microsoft Excel in a way that looks quite a bit like a maths problem. The question has spurred a rich dialogue about how to compare figures across worksheets and columns. Pick up some helpful tips and strategies . Stymied by your own research question? Ask at the Bar and then subscribe to twice-weekly email digests to see who's responded . > - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Monique Cuvelier is editor of the FreePint Newsletter. She has edited, launched and written for many magazines, newspapers and websites in the US and UK. Learn more about her at . > - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - The FreePint Bar is where you can get free help with your tricky research and information questions . Help with study for information-related courses is available at the FreePint Student Bar . Subscribe to the twice-weekly email digests at . > = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = *** Join the Job Seekers *** Information-related jobs at Jinfo can put you in a new position this summer. 30,000 job views last month -- search the database at: Subscribe to the free weekly update of the latest jobs, plus the monthly newsletter with career tips: > = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = JINFO :: JOBS IN INFORMATION The Jinfo service enables you to search and advertise information- related job vacancies. The Jinfo Newsletter now features CV Makeovers, in which a job seeker's CV is critiqued and revised by specialists in the field as well as career tips for all experience levels. Read the latest edition and subscribe free at . Jinfo Jobs in the FreePint Newsletter are supported through our partnership with Quantum2, an innovative skills development programme offered by Thomson Scientific. Learn more at Here is a selection of the latest featured entries in the Jinfo database: Assistant Librarian Central London Role available within a legal library of a government organisation based in central London starting as soon as possible. Recruiter: Aslib, The Association for Information Management Pre Lib/Graduate Information Assistant An exciting opportunity for an enthusiastic Pre Library School or Graduate to join this Legal Information Services team. Recruiter: Weekes Gray Recruitment Country: United Kingdom Business Information Librarian Experience of business research within a legal firm? Magic circle firm needs your skills! Recruiter: Sue Hill Recruitment and Services Limited Country: United Kingdom Head of Shared Understanding / Knowledge Manager HM Customs & Excise requires Senior Knowledge Manager to work in new position in Central London offices. Closing Date: 21st Sept 2007. Recruiter: Glen Recruitment Country: United Kingdom Research Consultant To provide business research and information services to a wide range of client companies. Recruiter: Tribal Country: United Kingdom Researcher Develop timely and dependable intelligence on which clients can base critical decisions. Recruiter: Capcon-Argen Limited Country: United Kingdom Information Manager Information Manager - Communications Team - providing expertise and guidance to support our specialist programmes. Recruiter: WRAP (Waste & Resources Action Programme) Country: United Kingdom Manager and Head, Library and Archives Responsible for managing and providing efficient Library, Archival and Records Management services for the Commonwealth Secretariat. Recruiter: The Commonwealth Secretariat Country: United Kingdom Information Management Analyst Do you have knowledge, experience and skills in the good practice organisation of information in our progressive environment? Recruiter: TMP Worldwide Country: United Kingdom Corporate Knowledge Manager Are you broadly experienced in knowledge management and ready to take on a high profile challenge within a large, complex council? Recruiter: TMP Worldwide Country: United Kingdom Subscription co-ordinator Leading press cuttings agency seeks help in maintaining subscription renewals. Recruiter: Durrants Country: United Kingdom Information and Training Assistant Carrying out research enquiries on behalf of lawyers and other professionals in the organisation. Recruiter: TFPL Country: United Kingdom [The above jobs are paid listings] NB: These are just a selection of information-related jobs in the Jinfo database . Receive the latest job listings weekly with the free Jinfo Update. Free to subscribe at Jinfo -- the best place for information-related job vacancies. * JOB SEARCHING? -- Free search and sign up to the Jinfo Newsletter * RECRUITING? -- Complete the form and advertise a vacancy for just GBP 195 -- 10% discount for agencies -- 50% discount for registered charities. Find out more today at > = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = > = = = = = = = = = = = = = ADVERTISEMENT = = = = = = = = = = = = = = Develop Your Strengths with Quantum2 For a wide array of hands-on training and resource materials, turn to Quantum2, an innovative skills development programme provided *free* by Thomson Scientific. The programme helps information professionals: + Expand your services through strategic and business competencies + Improve flow of information in your organisation + Gain visibility and build value for your work Discover best practices, *plus* the know-how to implement them. Free monthly newsletter and further information at: > = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =[QU2236] TIPS ARTICLE "A Primer: The Wonderful World of Internet Advertising" By David Sarokin Samuel Johnson famously said, 'When a man knows he is to be either hanged or fired from his online research job in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully.' Or something to that effect. When Google Answers announced that it was closing up shop at the end of 2006, leaving its quasi-staff of researchers to fend for themselves, my mind did, in fact, concentrate on a single thought: 'Oh my gawd ...What do I do now?' (Those not familiar with the wonderful, sad tale of Google Answers might want to see an earlier article I wrote .) Samuel J. was, perhaps, also the author of another pearl of wisdom (though I rather doubt it): 'When one door closes, another opens.' So it was with the demise of Google Answers, for it opened my eyes to the quite incredible world of online advertising. In looking for ways to continue as a professional researcher, I began to realise that Internet advertising - which up until then I had aggressively ignored - could help me build a business and rebuild my income. You should understand a few things about me right up front: 1) I'm very much a novice at the world of Internet advertising; 2) I don't, as a rule, care for advertising, Internet or otherwise; and 3) I like even less seeing English made ugly with phrases like 'increase eyeballs and monetise your website'. However, I'm more than happy to offer here my findings on how independent information workers like me can increase eyeballs and monetise their websites by making good use of Internet advertising tools. As bleak as the frenzy of online advertising appears to be, with pop-ups, intrusions, misdirects and all the other flotspam* on the Internet, there is, still, a silver lining to the whole thing. Internet Advertising 101 ------------------------ When you see (or hear) an advert - any advert, anywhere - it's a pretty basic economic truth that someone paid to have the advert displayed, and someone else is getting paid for displaying it. It's a simple enough concept, one that Google applied to the Web with astounding results, making billions of dollars seemingly overnight. The genius of Google's advertising business is that they made it simple for just about anyone to be an advertiser, or a displayer, or both. To put a lofty spin on things, this was a revolution; the democratisation of the world of advertising. Not convinced? Think of your own role - prior to the Internet age - as a would-be advertiser or as someone earning an income from displaying ads. For most people, their role as advertisers was limited to an occasional classified advert in the local paper, selling a car, or renting a room. As a displayer - someone getting paid to run ads - the average person simply didn't have a role, and never even imagined it as a possibility. 'Real' ads, on TV or in magazines, involved transactions of thousands of dollars, big production budgets and fancy Madison Avenue digs, and simply weren't the purview of the average citizen. Along comes Google, and Bingo! Everything changes. Suddenly, any Jane or John Doe can put an advert on the Internet, to be viewed by thousands or millions of people. Even the tiny-budgeted among us can still run a visible advertising campaign. And if John or Jane have a website, they can also become electronic billboards of sorts, displaying other folks' ads and earning some cash in the process. It's mid-morning as I'm writing, and I've earned $4.34 thus far on my own displays. Not bad, for doing nothing. Becoming an Advertiser ---------------------- Let's say you run a small business that you'd like to advertise on the Web. Nothing elaborate, just a small text advert with a link to your website. Google Adwords made it possible to do exactly that, even with a surprisingly small budget. Yahoo and Microsoft have since followed suit. The Big Three are Google Adwords , Yahoo! Search Marketing and Microsoft dCenter . Microsoft (of course) strikes me as the clunkiest of the three, but they all work the same way, do pretty much the same thing and at pretty much the same cost. The process is simple: 1) Design your advert; 2) decide how much you want to spend; 3) select your keywords; 4) go through endless rounds of tinkering. The end result is a small text advert that will appear in various places on the Web. The ads are 'content relevant', which is something of a mixed blessing. Your ads will appear on pages where the content - that is, the main topic of the page - is related to your advert . So, if you're selling headache remedies, your advert will likely appear on pages that discuss headaches. If you're selling your expertise in competitive intelligence, you will show up on pages related to competitive intelligence. As sensible as this seems, it's not the way advertising usually works. When you're watching a football game, there are rarely any ads about football. Instead, you're bombarded with ads about beer. There's no 'relevancy' to the content, other than the fact that football and beer are practically synonyms. Adwords and the Yahoo!/Microsoft equivalents, on the other hand, strive to match the content of your advert with the content of the pages on which it appears. The pages are usually individual websites or search results pages , depending on what options you select, although ads can also appear in blogs, group forums, maps and even in e-mail messages. Another important feature of Adwords is that they are pay-per-click ads, so that you pay not for the number of times the advert is seen, but for the number of times it's actually clicked on (there are some other options as well, but pay-per-click is the most common, by far). Where your advert appears, and how often it shows up, depends on how much money you're willing to spend, the keywords you've selected and the content of the website you're linking to. Earlier I said the process is simple. I lied. Oh, it's simple enough to get started, but like choosing a cell phone plan, there are so many options available, and they're so obliquely explained, that online advertising can quickly get weird. This is especially so in trying to pick keywords that will get noticed without expending your budget all in one click (the more popular a keyword, the more expensive it is to have your advert show up in response to that keyword). Hence step 4 above ... the endless tinkering. Complexities aside, you can set up an advertising campaign quickly, even on a dollar-a-day budget, and get yourself widely noticed. The jump in traffic to your website can be substantial, though at a cost, of course, since every click on your advert is a (usually) smallish expense that you have to pay out. Becoming a Billboard -------------------- The flip side of online advertising is Google's Adsense , where your website becomes an Internet billboard for ads (the very ones that people create in Adwords), and you can earn a (usually modest) income from people visiting your site, viewing the ads, and saints be praised, clicking on them. Most clicks seem to earn about a nickel or a dime, though it can be as little as a penny, or well over a dollar for a single click! Adsense strives to be content relevant, of course, which sometimes works well, and sometimes doesn't. My Dun and Bradstreet page generally produces very relevant ads, but a page on the history of the Why Did the Chicken Cross the Road Joke is not always as successful ... advertising fried chicken franchises isn't really the point, now, is it? (The posted ads are constantly changing, and are geographically targeted, so that you'll see a different collection every time you visit the site, and depending where you're located when you visit.) There are variations on the Adsense theme. You can host image ads, text ads, large banners, smallish boxes, line item ads. You can also add search boxes to your page, which can also generate income as they get used. And more sophisticated (possibly, more annoying) options are rapidly becoming available, involving video, flash, sound and other media choices. Yahoo! and Microsoft haven't picked up on this flip side of advertising (yet!) but Adsense certainly isn't your only option. There are a host of other advertising and income-generating opportunities, which I'm just beginning to explore myself. Displaying advertisements for books from Amazon.com is one of the most popular - you can earn up to 10% of any sales that are generated. A new service called Tumri is getting some buzz , which lets users build 'AdPod' widgets that offer more e-commerce functionality than a simple advert. Online advertising isn't going to make me rich. But then again, having a few hundred dollars in extra spending money every month certainly doesn't hurt. And if nothing else, online advertising can help you learn a few dozen languages: . * flotspam - If it's not a real word, it should be. > - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - David Sarokin is a well-known expert on Internet research skills, and (alas) a former researcher with Google Answers. He now runs his own research service at XooxleAnswers.com , and also participates in the group research service at Uclue.com (both of which are well worth checking out, if he may say so himself). He also has a quirky word-history site at FirstMention.com , guaranteed to appeal to at least two or three FreePint readers. You can reach him with any feedback at . > - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Related FreePint links: * "Google Answers is Dead! Long Live Google Answers!" By David Sarokin * "Local Search, The Search Engines and Yellow Pages" By Duncan Parry * "Pay Per Click Search Engines and Promoting your Website" By Duncan Parry > = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = * Insight on Data and Service Providers * Newly published: D&B and Hoover's, Alacra Company Portfolio Series puts all the relevant information in a single file: product reviews, news and essential-facts overview. Now available: * Alacra * Bureau van Dijk Electronic Publishing * D&B and Hoover's * Factiva * LexisNexis * OneSource * Cut your due diligence time with the convenient Company Portfolio Reports: Purchase online with a credit card for immediate access. > = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = REVIEW "The Virtual Reference Handbook: Interview and Information Delivery Techniques for the Chat and E-mail Environments" Written by Diane Kovacs Reviewed by Laura Suttell Looks can be deceiving. This thin paperback volume opened my eyes to the challenges of providing reference service by what I formerly thought of as 'non-traditional means'. I have seen the present, and, thanks to Diane Kovacs, I'm not afraid. "The Virtual Reference Handbook" is organised into four main sections; the first, entitled 'Technical, Communications, and Reference Skills and Knowledge for Virtual Reference Librarians', stresses the importance of the reference interview and compares the processes used for face-to-face, chat and e-mail interviews. I was glad to see that the reference interview is still the starting point for helping patrons in the virtual world. While I receive about a third of my daily reference queries by e-mail, I now realise I'm actually not participating in virtual reference. I have the flexibility to pick up the phone, or, in some cases, meet face-to-face with a patron. Kovacs discusses ways to communicate with patrons by chat or e-mail, letting them know the librarian is paying attention to their questions during the virtual reference interview, since non-verbal forms of communication, such as eye contact and gestures, are missing in virtual reference. What I like most about this book is its organisation and emphasis on practising until you're comfortable with the many skills that contribute to providing virtual reference. I mentioned the book is broken into four main sections above, but each one has a section on competencies, questions and answers with eight librarians currently providing virtual reference, self-assessment activities, and a list of reference and recommended reading. Technical competencies are as important as reference skills, and Kovacs provides links for Web-based learning activities. How do you make it on the West End? Practise. The same is true for virtual reference. Librarians need to be adept at attaching and sending files by e-mail, using toolbars and plugs-ins, and scanning documents to send to patrons. Chapter 3, 'Practice and Expand Communication Skills and Knowledge for the Virtual Reference Interview', certainly builds on the material in previous chapters. Again, Kovacs interviews seasoned virtual reference providers, asking them to share their 'bad' chat interview stories and lessons learned. She lists Web-based tutorials to improve communication skills and provides information on professional discussion lists and blogs for librarians using virtual reference. She and her fellow librarians consider the uses of emoticons and chat styles, and the author gives a list of common chat and e-mail abbreviations. The final part of this true handbook focuses on maintaining and building reference skills and knowledge. Librarians need to have a full toolbox of core reference resources and be able to guide and instruct patrons in the use of these materials, whether they are electronic or print. There are many thought-provoking quotes, which I won't re-type here, that made me smile and nod to myself. I like the fact that Kovacs includes references to journal articles, papers and books throughout this title. If I come away from reading this book with only one thought, it would be 'remember why you became a reference librarian, way back when' and, with some practice and informal training, the pieces will fall into place. > - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Laura Suttell has been a reference librarian at Phillips Lytle, in Buffalo, NY, since 2001. She received her MLS degree from the State University of New York at Buffalo in 1994 and serves as a board member and grants committee coordinator for her local chapter of the American Association of Law Libraries. Suttell is also the Buffalo coordinator for the Special Libraries Association's Upstate New York Chapter. She has assisted in planning the 2007 Northeast Regional Law Libraries Meeting - Libraries Without Borders II, and is looking forward to this event, happening this October in Toronto. > - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Related FreePint links: * Find out more about this book online at the FreePint Bookshelf * FreePint Strategy Bookshelf * "Implementing Digital Reference Services" Edited by Lankes, McClure, Gross and Pomerantz Reviewed by Alison Turner Related links: * Read customer comments and buy this book at Amazon.co.uk or Amazon.com Propose an information-related book or resource for review today. Send details to Monique Cuvelier, editor of FreePint . > = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = "Thanks for all that I have learnt from FreePint over the years. It is the one completely indispensable email newsletter I get." -- UK Tell your story: Provide your FreePint testimonial here: > = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = FEATURE ARTICLE "Search Trails: Back to the Future" By Nigel Hamilton Humans are great at discovering new things, but not always so good at remembering how we found them. Since the first caveman discovered fire, the knowledge has been passed down through the ages. In a way we've all been touched by that first flame and the idea of it is still burning. Fire was a fantastic discovery, but human language is our best discovery yet as a way of infecting others with new ideas. With language we can pass more than DNA on to the next generation: we can pass on discoveries too. But spoken language is ephemeral ('Sorry, how do I make it spark again? I can't hear properly; The Neanderthals are shouting.') So humankind came up with ways of fossilizing our ideas into written symbols on various media: cave walls, stone tablets, papyrus scrolls, books and more recently 1GB memory sticks. Bringing order to chaos ----------------------- The Internet is a massive archaeological pile of fossilized ideas. But armed with an average query of 2.5 keywords and Google, we can still dive into the pile and come out relatively unscathed. But for how long? The pile of information is growing and growing. According to the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), there are 1,173 million Internet users as of June 2007, compared with 938 million two years ago. Currently Google only crawls part of the pile. Vast tracts of valuable information reside in topic-specific search engines out of the Google crawler's reach. The Google PageRank algorithm tries to bring order to some of the pile by ranking Web pages: 'Google provides its views on pages' relative importance,' according to the Google website. But the polarity of PageRank is still skewed in favour of the publishers. PageRank is conferred by Web publishers to other Web publishers in the form of referral links - not by users. Consequently Web publishers, ably assisted by an army of search engine optimisers (SEOs), are playing Google's PageRank for profit. The raison d'etre of SEOs is to create optimally relevant pages tuned to the Google algorithm so their clients' pages appear high in Google's results. Although these pages appear relevant they lack a crucial ingredient: authority. It was 'authority' conferred by referral links that propelled Google's PageRank to be the premier retrieval algorithm for the Web, and it is authority that is ebbing away as the SEOs and Web publishers take control of their position in Google's results by manipulating PageRank. Power to the people ------------------- We need a system of Darwinian information selection where the users, not publishers, decide the best answer for a given query. Shouldn't users be given more authority in deciding what is, or isn't relevant? Social search provides this by determining the relevance of search results in accordance with actual usage. Every day millions of people search the Web and apply human intellect to making search discoveries, yet this effort is mostly wasted. The pile grows and grows but remains untouched by the humans sifting through it. The promise of social search is to harness this communal effort for the good of all. But how can we bring human order to the pile? I've been wrestling with this question for the past six years and I believe the answer lies in the prescient vision of Dr Vannevar Bush in his 1945 seminal paper "As We May Think" . Bush describes a machine called a Memex that augments your memory and searching powers by helping you to create and share 'trails of association' between things in the 'common record' (analogous to the Internet). Back in 1945 this concept must have seemed wild but Bush successfully predicted the future by directly influencing it. Bush inspired Ted Nelson (hypertext), Sir Tim Berners-Lee (WWW) and many others to realise his vision of an 'interlinked common record'. However, there are still major parts of his functional specification missing. Trailblazing, for example, is a crucial, yet largely overlooked part of Bush's invention: 'There is a new profession of trail blazers, those who find delight in the task of establishing useful trails through the enormous mass of the common record. The inheritance from the master becomes, not only his additions to the world's record, but for his disciples the entire scaffolding by which they are erected.' Trailblazing ------------ Every day millions of people blaze search trails into the pile but most of that search effort just goes up in smoke. How can all this search effort be harnessed simply and unobtrusively? Fortunately something as simple as saving and displaying a search trail can capture the association between human search desire and its satisfaction. Let me give you a personal example. I spent my first five years at the University of Queensland in Australia trudging from the car park (known then as the Dust Bowl) up a winding path to lectures. The winding path, colloquially called the Goat Trail, was etched into the grass thanks to the collective unconscious of all the students rushing to lectures - a planner could not have designed a more optimal route. Around November each year the Goat Trail would inexplicably change route - it suddenly diverted around a large pair of jacaranda trees. The jacaranda trees at the university flower beautifully and smell even better, but local legend has it that they are deadly to students - especially around exam time. The legend warns that if a jacaranda flower lands on your head you're certain to fail your exams. New students who had never heard of the brain-busting jacaranda flower were spared failure thanks to following the Goat Trail. I remember marvelling at the high technology of a simple path on the ground. It was, in essence, a meme-filtering machine. The Goat Trail actively encoded the association between search desire and the destination (lecture hall) and was malleable enough to move with the times (watch out for those flowers). A similar system is required for Web search. Who needs all that fancy AJAX-ian widgetry on the Web? Search engines just need to provide a simple system of way- finding - we can trust humans to do the rest. A trail is a simple method of showing the way. On the Web a search trail begins with a search engine, typically 2.5 keywords, a sequence of clicks and ends hopefully, but not always, at a relevant result. Over time the association between a search keyword (desire) and its most traversed destination becomes stronger. This is analogous to human memory. Each time a memory trail is traversed the synaptic gaps fire between neurons and the engram, or unconscious memory, is reinforced. The more times this trail of neurons fires the stronger the memory becomes. If it fires less frequently, the memory fades. Saving memory lane ------------------ The real achievement of human memory is not what we remember but what we forget. Everyday life is full of forgettable factoids and our memory does a great job of filtering them out. Shouldn't search engines do the same? Despite what the publishers say a lot of the pile is worth forgetting, and we need a system that behaves just like human memory on a communal scale. I believe large-scale trailblazing can act like a global search memory: reinforcing but also fading the associations between search desires (keywords) and destinations (URLs). Vannevar Bush lamented the 'artificiality of indexing' and hoped that 'selection by association, rather than indexing, may yet be mechanised'. I hope so too. The time has come for a pure interaction layer that sits above the Web and acts as an associative lens that can burn trails through the pile. It's time to let the users leave their mark on the pile - not just publishers. There is a simple democratic truth to a physical trail in the grass - it's transparent, open and honest. Millions of micro- discoveries are made every day and we have the means to pass them on to each other - search trails offer a simple way for us to do it. > - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Nigel Hamilton is the CEO and mastermind behind Trexy.com. Trexy enables users to remember and share their search discoveries on the Web by creating search trails. Nigel initially developed Turbo10.com's 'Deep Net' metasearch technology for connecting to search engines in the 'invisible Web' or Deep Net. Based on this Deep Net technology Nigel invented a way of sharing search trails. Prior to establishing Trexy.com and its sister search engine Turbo10.com, Nigel worked as an intellectual property barrister and information systems lecturer. Nigel holds a Bachelor and Masters in Information Technology (BinfTech, MInfSys) and a Masters of Law (LLM) in intellectual property. He is an active member of the British Computer Society (MBCS). > - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Related FreePint links: * "Life of the Party: Social Web Browsers" By Stephanie Taylor * "An Introduction to Search Engines and Web Navigation" Written by Mark Levene Reviewed by David Stuart * "Searching for success: an update on search engine developments" By Duncan Parry * "Extreme Searcher's Guide to Web Search Engines" Written by Randolph Hock Reviewed by Nick Lloyd * "What's the Big Deal With Social Search?" 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