[Search-l] info literacy

[EVANS, KENNETH (WOODY)]

>From Search Wikia:

"Search is part of the fundamental infrastructure of the Internet. And,
it is currently broken.

Why is it broken? It is broken for the same reason that proprietary
software is always broken: lack of freedom, lack of community, lack of
accountability, lack of transparency. Here, we will change all that.

There have been some amazing projects in recent years which have matured
now to the point that a new alternative is possible. Wikia is funding
and supporting the development of something radically new.

I love that "we can do it!" attitude... and I agree that search can be
better - and, why not, it can be open, collaborative, communal if you
wish. I hope that these values actually do make search better.

But search is not broken. What's broken is the assumptions of searchers.

Google is awesome, but it has built up a digerati culture of false
hope... "Just google it."

When I teach information literacy classes, I spend a lot of time talking
about search. And when I teach the use of Google, it's only after I've
taught critical thinking skills and information evaluation. It's after
I've taught authority and upper-level domain names. It's after I've
taught Boolean operators... so that by the time I get around to showing
the class how to "google" keenly, the class ought to know how to
freehand most of the advanced search features I show them in Google, and
they know how to apply those tools to other search engines.

If Search Wikia (or any other engine) plays to supposed "simplicity"
while sacrificing a searcher's info literacy skills - that's what'll
break search. If search is broken it's because we're not teaching
ourselves how to search, or how to evaluate what we find.

...you know??

 

 

Woody Evans

(Librarian) <mailto:woody.evans at tccd.edu> 

 

Blogged at ghostfeet.

 

"Bigotry is the disease of ignorance, of morbid minds; enthusiasm of the
free and buoyant. Education & free discussion are the antidotes of
both."

          - Thomas Jefferson

 

________________________________

From: search-l-bounces at wikia.com [mailto:search-l-bounces at wikia.com] On
Behalf Of Aerik Sylvan
Sent: Tuesday, May 08, 2007 2:33 PM
To: jer
Cc: search-l at wikia.com
Subject: Re: [Search-l] putting my hand up

 

 

On 5/8/07, jer <jeremie at jabber.org> wrote:


Does anyone know the folks at Eurekster?  A really good faith step,
outside of any patents, would be for them to openly license all of
the user contributed data back to the users / community and make it
available in some format.  It feels like something that any site 
built on user contributions should be doing or at least allowing the
option for users to do.  Just my 2c :)


I think that's the exciting thing about the protocol you're talking
about - if there's a possiblity of aggregating different types/sources
of user-contributed data.  I think there will be resistance and
questions about about the sharing of data with a for-profit entity
though... if you have multiple for-profit entities, competing at least
to some degree for the same eyeballs... well, there are bound to be
questions. 

However, I'd be happy to link the data (~ 25k and growing website
descriptions, GFDL licensed) from my wiki based dmoz style directory to
the project.  :-)

Best Regards,
Aerik
http://www.wikidweb.com - the Wiki Directory of the Web

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