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Taking a stab at (groking) Google Book Search

Dr. Peter Jacso, of the University of Hawaii, has a good analysis of the interruptions in logic of Google Book Search. Among others, the dear beast has trouble conforming to the Boolean OR operation: with keywords searches on arrogant OR arrogance producing more results than the combined number for each phrase alone. Some of these results, in his ongoing analysis of GBS stand, in bleak contrast to the sophistication of the main search engine. This is perhaps because Google is attempting to use its web index algorithms to retrieve the data, as Battelle suggests, against the grain of typical information retrieval and structured search systems. Perhaps these are bugs in designing that system?

Jasco also compares GBS to Amazon’s book search, with devastating results. Bottom-line:

Beyond simple keyword searching, Google’s software seems to be cognitively challenged, to put it nicely, and hinders access to the content, which would deserve at least a functional and half as smart software as Amazon has.”

Gary Price, who always appreciates the proper acknowledgment that book digitization began before Google, has more.

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