Comments on: Please Don’t Use Google To Research References

By: albachtimi

albachtimi — Wed, 14 May 2008 06:22:44 +0000

May be You use Contradictive Theory, because when most people use Google to search related content with their needs… And You have an opinion that suggest people don’t use Google to research…

It’s good article, and make us as internet lovers gives any reaction to this post.

By: albachtimi

albachtimi — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 05:54:44 +0000

yes, I think Google very powerfull search engine in all aspects, especially to research any objects..

By: Geoff Dodd

Geoff Dodd — Sun, 18 Feb 2007 01:29:20 +0000

Lorelle,

Google Scholar has worked for me on the rare occasions I’ve needed such info. The trick is to put specifics into your search string that land you a tiny number of specific pages. Dates, names, key concepts. Thanks again Lorelle for your fine blog.

By: Information Accuracy on the Internet « Behold My Glory

Information Accuracy on the Internet « Behold My Glory — Wed, 06 Dec 2006 22:29:50 +0000

[...] Lorelle posted an article recently called Please Don’t Use Google To Research References, and I agree with most of what she says. I especially like that she sends people to Snopes to debunk e-mail rumors. I’m a fan of replaying to forwards about how Bill Gates is going to pay everyone to forward this message with links to that site, which is probably why I don’t get those anymore. Mission accomplished! But I think Lorelle (and her commenters) miss the usefulness of Wikipedia. [...]

By: onlycrook

onlycrook — Sun, 03 Dec 2006 05:27:56 +0000

My two favorite sources are http://www.firstgov.gov which has a great search engine for all types of government sites and http://www.lii.org, which I use a lot more often than ipl.org (which seems to have more outdated links). I use google/yahoo/etc. every day, but then I’m a librarian. The worst situation for me was trying to educate a younger teacher who just let his kids search willy-nilly with no effort given to teach advanced searching or evaluation. Evaluation is the key, but school librarians are a dying breed as we are generally considered too expensive and unnecessary.

By: me

me — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 01:31:08 +0000

Google is a tool. Ditch screwdrivers because people use them to open paint cans, chisel things, or murder with them besides turning screws?

The issues relate to critical thinking and access.

Not everyone has online access to libraries collections. If they do great! Use the library’s online sources. If not then they need the skills to approach free online info with healthy skepticism.

Here’s a good example of how to help people understand how to vet a website/source
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/healthywebsurfing.html

There’s plenty of great, free, non-commercial (and some commercial) information and databases. If Google helps people access it efficiently then USE Google.

You asked for some good sources, so why not take a look at Internet Public Library http://www.ipl.org/

By: Tom

Tom — Thu, 30 Nov 2006 17:09:56 +0000

I use Google quite regularly, and it can be used effectively. When searching for vetted statistics (on public education, for example), I will often restrict my search to “site:.gov OR site:.edu”.

Knowing how to use advanced techniques on any search engine is invaluable.

By: engtech

engtech — Thu, 30 Nov 2006 16:51:56 +0000

Wikipedia gets quoted all the time, but it’s actually quite a bad source because it’s constantly changing.

By: Lorelle VanFossen

Lorelle VanFossen — Thu, 30 Nov 2006 12:32:43 +0000

I forgot to add that I am a user and supporter of Google, and have written many articles about the various Google search features, including:

Genealogy Research With Google Book Search
Genealogy Research on the Google Directory
Google Offers Historical Newspaper and Archive Searches

I’m not saying “ban Google search”. I’m saying remember there are a lot of other options, and many of them are not based upon a popularity contest but upon facts and figures, so you are more likely to find truth rather than conjecture, at least more easily as some of the other resources won’t allow conjecture.

Like broadening the mind, broaden your search options.

And honestly, if you are seriously researching a scientific or educational project, like Edrei says, citing such references doesn’t say much for your professional standards.

By: Mike

Mike — Thu, 30 Nov 2006 12:04:41 +0000

Thank you, thank you, thank you. While your at it, not Wikipedia either. Do you recall the news story about the morons that published research that was done entirely out of wiki only to discover that it had inaccuracies.
Wikiality