Browse and Search To Become Old-Fashioned Distinctions?

Gene Smith’s comments on browse vs. search makes me think the difference between search and browse is melting away, it’s a matter of using the right metadata to describe the content so even the search is basically an automated browse…bouncing from topic to topic to extract the right information.

As a scenario, it’ll be like when they do research by talking to the computer on Star Trek, circa Next Generation.

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Categorized as Search

Cheerleaders and Search Engines

Looking at my referers I see people often find their way here by searching Google for ‘noise where I’m currently result #9. While this is like warm massage oil on my ego, it confirms what I used to rant about (see March 12) that popular doesn’t necessarily equal better (or more relevant). Does a person searching for ‘noise‘ really want my content? I doubt it.

The same search on Teoma actually brings up a bunch of pages about noise: noise pollution, the Institute of Noise Control, noise and hearing loss…those are quality results. And while this is an isolated example, the difference is striking. For pure relevancy, I’m starting to look into Teoma.

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Categorized as Search

New User Roadmap

The DAML (The DARPA Agent Markup Language Homepage ) site has a nice variation on the usual site map – the new user roadmap. They list some of the primary users:

  • software developer
  • XML enthusiast
  • logician
  • WWW standards junkie
  • program manager
  • Semantic Web researcher
  • military user
  • reporter

and each is a link to a set of pages for that user type to explore in order to learn about DAML:

Logician


  • About DAML
  • DAML+OIL walkthru
  • DAML+OIL axiomatic semantics
  • DAML+OIL model theoretic semantics
  • www-rdf-logic@w3.org email list
  • subscribe to the HotDAML Newsletter

And since these are metadata folks, I wouldn’t be surprised if these categories are populated dynamically using metadata.

Bridget’s Google Hacking

Bridget is experimenting with how to improve Google’s ranking of a particular site. A little bombing and tweaking of the title tag did wonders.

Historical note: years ago I submitted this blog to Bridget’s portal and she was nice enough to note me in her blog, and the link popularity spread from there. So perhaps I can help return the favor by helping her cause: santa cruz real estate :)

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Categorized as Search