Changing Pattern of Searching

When we seek information online, search engines come to our mind first. And indeed, search engines cater to an overwhelming percentage of information seekers on the web. Led by search engines themselves, our search queries have now qualified from simple search to more categorical, like image search, news search, local search, book search and so on. Yet, search engines may not often answer your queries to your satisfaction.

 

With the development of information-flow on the web, 2 definite patterns emerge – first, that from search engine to user, and second, from user to user. In the first case, search engines respond to search queries by fetching the most relevant web pages from their database. This is the most common form of flow of information.

 

In the case of latter, information flows from one user to another either real-time or after a time-lag. Blogs and forums are good examples here (emails and chats are not considered because they are personalized exchange of information). In recent time, there has been significant advancement in this type of information flow.

 

To peruse the point further, let us look at 3 renowned web entities, Google, Wikipedia and Yahoo! Answers. Of the 3, Google is an example of one-way information flow from it to users, for which it depends on data it has collected and stored in its database. Wikipedia and Yahoo! Answers, on the other hand, are dependent on users’ voluntary contributions. Since all three have emerged as hugely popular, it is apparent that getting information online will become rather easy in sharp contrast to gruelling exercise of yesteryears.

 

Google Search

 

Except for Book Search and Google Map, nearly all other Google offerings are founded on historical (and ongoing) search-behaviour data, culled by Google over many years. These are bare-bone data, devoid of flab or color, because the searchers have willingly provided them without any thought of favour. These data are therefore very valuable source to derive meaningful information.

 

Since the huge mass of people, who surf the web, come from nearly all segments of society, from all countries and dispersed among all age groups, they leave behind a rich resource of search-behaviour patterns that change from place to place and over time. With such a disparate aggregation of people using their service, it is evident that the first thing search engines will try to do is to broadly classify the users’ respective demands, so that it is possible to offer more value aimed at each demand-group.

 

This is akin to what giants like Google and Yahoo have been doing for the past couple of years. Making use of large amount of search-behaviour data in their respective repositories, they are mining them to work out and offer a slew of refined search experience. Google’s news search, image search, local search, etc. are examples of that. Irrespective of whether these have improved relevance of search results, users have no doubt welcomed the new alternatives.

 

To its credit, Google is also offering innovative products like Gmail, Orkut, Blogger, AdSense, Google Maps, etc. to tie up its users within its fold. All the while, it pin-pointedly targets its users with text ads (AdWords), which helps it to shore up significant revenue.

 

Recently, in May this year, a project called Wikimapia has come into being that uses Google Maps with a wiki system, in which users can create and edit rectangular hotspots overlaying the maps to describe a place. Though similar sounding, Wikimapia is not related to Wikipedia. As it grows popular and attains perfection, Wikimapia is expected to become another source of search information.

 

Wikipedia



Wikipedia is a voluntary effort, a free encyclopaedia that “anyone can edit”. As such, Wikipedia is a registered trademark of the non-profit organization, Wikimedia Foundation. Considering that it started only in January, 2001, the wealth of information that it already has is truly awesome. It amazes that voluntary contributions can indeed make up such a big treasure. This is what Wikipedia has to say about itself:

“Since its creation in 2001, Wikipedia has rapidly grown into the largest reference website on the Internet. The content of Wikipedia is free, written collaboratively by people from all around the world. This website is a wiki, which means that anyone with access to an Internet-connected computer can edit, correct, or improve information throughout the encyclopaedia, simply by clicking the edit this page link (with a few minor exceptions, such as protected articles and the main page).

 

As of 2006, it includes millions of articles and pages worldwide, and content from hundreds of thousands of contributors.”

 

Seen through an avid surfer’s eyes, while search engines can be said to provide results in the form of relevant and not-so-relevant web pages for you to continue searching and selecting, Wikipedia takes it to higher gear by offering complete relevant information for a search-term. It’s a classic example of user-to-user flow of information.

 

Since it is a voluntary effort, Wikipedia earns money purely from donations. Apart from Wilipedia, which is more widely known, Wikimedia also serves Wikitionary, Wikinews, Wikiquote and others.

 

Yahoo! Answers

 

Yahoo! Answers  is perhaps the first of its kind and is distinctly different from pure search or encyclopaedic efforts like Wikipedia. It is more a community-driven service that allows users to ask and answer questions among themselves. The flow of information is similar to that in forums, but there ends any other similarity. Forums are usually subject-specific, and so for your different questions, you need to sign up with multiple forums. Not so with Yahoo! Answers. Here, once you are a registered user, you can ask and answer virtually any question. Sample some questions: 

1. 
   
   How many ants are there on the planet?
   
   


2. 
   
   What classes do I have to take to become an astronaut?
   
   


3. 
   
   If someone gives direct eye contact for about 3 seconds or more, are they interested?
   
   


4. 
   
   If I have the company's name and their address, how can I get their website or e-mail address? 
   
   

Yahoo! is trying hard to popularize this program. It awards points for answering questions and also for voting on questions asked. The point system is designed to elicit good answers from participants. Users, who consistently give good answers, are featured on Yahoo! 360º blog . It already has more than 10 million answers that have been asked since inception.

 

What do experts say?

 

In a June 8 article [http://searchenginewatch.com/searchday/article.php/3612046], Danny Sullivan of SearchEngineWatch shows that Yahoo! Answers has recorded impressive growth compared to Google Answers, though as of June 3, it has just 0.044% of internet audience. In another statistics (from Hitwise), he shows that for week ending May 13, Yahoo! Answers has already climbed to number 3 position (2.94%) in terms of market-share in the category called “Education/Reference”, behind the pole position of Wikipedia (16.76%). Note that this statistics refers to US users only.

 

Will Wikipedia be overshadowed by Yahoo! Answers? It is still early days to answer that. The point is that there is a wide divergence between how information is provided by the two. In case of Yahoo! Answers, it is still more of addiction. Though addiction does create a zing value, to sustain it is a different matter altogether. How Yahoo! Answers will shape up in future is a matter of conjecture. For now, for the more serious-minded, for those who disfavor addiction, Wikipedia will be the destination. Perhaps the real answer lies in Google’s apparent disinterest in this field. We will wait and see.