So here we go – Google is jumping into the social media search world. “SearchWiki” is Google’s answer to the question “Why can’t I make search work the way I want it to work, and share/learn from others doing the same thing?”
But one wonders if Google searchers have that question to begin with. As I’ve argued elsewhere, Google search had become a bit like the morning newspaper of yore – social glue that all of us could depend on because the results were pretty consistent. I don’t believe that search shouldn’t change – I’m a major proponent of change, particularly in the interface. But as Mike points out, many folks may not want this kind of change.
From Google’s announcement:
Have you ever wanted to mark up Google search results? Maybe you’re an avid hiker and the trail map site you always go to is in the 4th or 5th position and you want to move it to the top. Or perhaps it’s not there at all and you’d like to add it. Or maybe you’d like to add some notes about what you found on that site and why you thought it was useful. Starting today you can do all this and tailor Google search results to best meet your needs.,,,Today we’re launching SearchWiki, a way for you to customize search by re-ranking, deleting, adding, and commenting on search results.
..The changes you make only affect your own searches. But SearchWiki also is a great way to share your insights with other searchers. You can see how the community has collectively edited the search results by clicking on the “See all notes for this SearchWiki” link.
Clearly Google will learn a ton about search behavior through this new set of features, and presumably that will improve core search results. But what I find interesting in all this is what is says about what Google knows, and therefore decided to do. Google knows folks come to the site for repeat navigation – to find places they have already visited. And they know that they go there for discovery – to find things they’ve never visited but hope to find. A move like this seems to point Google toward bringing the two together, and potentially, re-portalizing the web.
What do I mean by that? Well, it’s clear that Google is the starting point for a very large percentage of folks on the web. But while many of us start there, we don’t spend much time there – we use Google as a way to jump from place to place. If, however, we can customize Google to become a one stop shop with all our favorite places, as well as comments and social connections, we may well change our behaviors and spend more time at that start place. While Google has never announced numbers, it’s commonly assumed that its iGoogle start page is getting less than stellar traction. But iGoogle + SearchWiki? That just might do it.
I’d like to post more thoughts on this development but the SearchWiki code has not propagated to my account, so I can’t really test drive it. I’m sure when it does, more thoughts will come up….