Social Search: useful tool or timewaster

Social search: useful tool or time waster ? Karen Blakeman, http://www.rba.co.uk/ Internet Librarian International, London, 15th-16th October 2009 : 

Social search: useful tool or time waster ? Karen Blakeman, http://www.rba.co.uk/ Internet Librarian International, London, 15th-16th October 2009 05 December 2009 Karen Blakeman www.rba.co.uk 1 Photo: Google Street View This presentation is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License

Why social search? : 

Why social search? Publican hiring bar staff using Facebook to pre-screen candidates Student used YouTube to find information on the life cycle of the Duck Billed Platypus for an essay Business students assignment on advertising history of Cadbury’s Crème Egg and Dairy Milk – Youtube Conference speaker used Twitter and Facebook to find a Norwegian translator for his presentation Essential part of reputation monitoring for all organisations Essential when researching organisations, competitors, etc What’s happening at Internet Librarian International?! 05 December 2009 Karen Blakeman www.rba.co.uk 2

Slide 3: 

05 December 2009 Karen Blakeman www.rba.co.uk 3

Google Caffeine http://www.comparecaffeine.com/ : 

Google Caffeine http://www.comparecaffeine.com/ 05 December 2009 Karen Blakeman www.rba.co.uk 4

Google “Show options” : 

Google “Show options” 05 December 2009 Karen Blakeman www.rba.co.uk 5

Firefox - customise Google results : 

Firefox - customise Google results 05 December 2009 Karen Blakeman www.rba.co.uk 6

Yahoo! : 

Yahoo! http://www.yahoo.co.uk/ http://search.yahoo.co.uk/ http://search.yahoo.com/ May start using Bing web search next year Now includes options to limit search to selected networking sites 05 December 2009 Karen Blakeman www.rba.co.uk 7

123People.com : 

123People.com Searches image sections of major search engines Flickr Facebook MySpace LinkedIn blogs web videos news 05 December 2009 Karen Blakeman www.rba.co.uk 8

The People Search Engine – Whoozy.com : 

The People Search Engine – Whoozy.com 05 December 2009 Karen Blakeman www.rba.co.uk 9

Do social media, “real-time” search tools work? : 

Do social media, “real-time” search tools work? Phil Bradley’s blog for examples and reviews http://philbradley.typepad.com/ Here today and gone tomorrow Don’t always work on all of the services they claim to cover Superficial coverage but you may only need a quick overview For serious research learn how to use individual, specialist search tools or search the service itself 05 December 2009 Karen Blakeman www.rba.co.uk 10

For example: searching Twitter and tweets : 

For example: searching Twitter and tweets Searching public tweets http://search.twitter.com/, http://www.twazzup.com/ Google advanced web search and use site search on twitter.com Use your Twitter client on your desktop, laptop, mobile, iphone e.g. Tweetdeck, Seesmic Review: 8 free Twitter clients for better tweeting http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9138067/Review_8_free_Twitter_clients_for_better_tweeting?taxonomyId=16&pageNumber=2 Tweepz.com - Twitter People Phil Bradley's weblog: Twitter Search - 20 alternative search engines http://philbradley.typepad.com/phil_bradleys_weblog/2009/03/twitter-search-20-alternative-search-engines.html 05 December 2009 Karen Blakeman www.rba.co.uk 11

Potential drawbacks : 

Potential drawbacks Users may not appreciate limitations of social media and electronic information in general Assumption that today’s technologies have been around for ever original TV coverage of the storming of the Bastille podcast of Abraham Lincoln delivering the Gettysburg address photo of the baby Jesus with Joseph and Mary Accuracy and authority of information mis-information, intentional or accidental has always existed social networks/web 2 can correct wrong information Twitter campaign to correct mis-reporting by UK newspaper on cervical cancer vaccination and death of a teenager 05 December 2009 Karen Blakeman www.rba.co.uk 12

Social search: useful tool or time waster? : 

Social search: useful tool or time waster? You go to where the conversations are, where the chat is, where the buzz is It is where people feel comfortable asking questions and sharing information It is where an increasing proportion of the population grew up You can’t ‘gag’ social networks BBC NEWS | Politics | When is a secret not a secret? http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8304908.stm For serious research, social search and Web 2.0 are not optional extras - they are an essential part of a search strategy 05 December 2009 Karen Blakeman www.rba.co.uk 13