[Sigia-l] re: the future of search

[Peter Merholz]

Wow. An otherwise cogent response totally torpedoed by this coda:

> Nobody does "research" on the web. They may want to pretend to themselves
> that they do, but they don't. You can certainly get some interesting and
> useful information very quickly, and you may not, but let's not delude
> ourselves into thinking that anybody is doing "research". A thesis demands
> much more than a couple of Google searches! Or at least, I hope it will
for
> a few more years!

This smacks of academic snobbery to a disturbing agree.

Of course people do research on the Web. "Research" isn't just about writing
theses. In our work for PeopleSoft, we know the degree to which people use
the Web for researching enterprise-level software decisions. And, it's
pretty substantial. (Though, of course, not total.)

As a tool for people researching in order to support immediate job
functions, I'd argue that the Web is MASSIVE. Because, often, you don't need
deep. You need to survey the landscape, and find a few interest points.
Something to put in a PowerPoint deck.

And, yes, that's "research."

--peter