Comments on: Tuesday Bits

By: Avi Rappoport, SearchTools

Avi Rappoport, SearchTools — Wed, 09 Mar 2005 22:19:49 +0000

I agree with you, that a semi-random collection of documents can't provide enough insight into what someone is searching for. It surely won't work for shared computers, and for personal computers where recipes and jokes are mixed in with research.

Even beyond that, any one person will be searching based on their needs at the time. A bioscientist researching caffiene will have a lot of research reports on their disk, and an algorthim would probably notice that. But if they search for "coffee", there's no way to tell if they want technical papers, local cafes, online roasteries or what.

I think "personalization" for search is best offered as suggestions for more precise queries, rather than as an intervening filter for search results.

By: Matt McAlister

Matt McAlister — Wed, 09 Mar 2005 02:43:40 +0000

I’ve spent too much time fighting comment spam in the past, so comments won’t be enabled until I get that sorted out. Sorry, dendrite.

By: dendrite

dendrite — Wed, 09 Mar 2005 00:50:33 +0000

Regarding McAlister's post: What a bunch of jargony B.S. Who the hell uses the term "digerati" anyway?

Comparing Google to the CIA??? Let us see what's in their database??? I *know* what's in Google's database: Links! The content is on the Web, not google's hard drives. (Don't even think of pointing out the cached pages either.)

Wish he had the balls to enable comments. I'd post there. Alas.