by the National Security Agency

“ The point, of course, is that no one is out of reach of this powerful, invasive technology. We change the world with our technology and we, in turn, are altered by that same technology. It remains to be seen where our technology leads us, whether into an "endless frontier" [1] or, more ominously, into a "cemetery of dead ideas." ”

“ Most search-offs and wide-ranging studies continue tofind surprisingly little overlap among major search engines, so use more than one search engine as a general rule. The Internet is now being widely used for "serious" research, which means higher quality, more reliable information on the web. But, as with any research source, you must weigh the validity, accuracy, currency, and overall quality of the information before using it. Search engines rely on statistical interfaces, concept-based search mechanisms, or link analysis to return and rank hits ”

“ With its clean, spare look, Google changed the face of Internet search by moving away from the portal concept to pure search. While it is true that Google offers a directory as well as other types of searches-Image, news, shopping, groups-Google's focus has always been on web search. Google's new look, which debuted in April 2004, included removing the directory tab from the Google home page, further evidence of the decreasing importance of directories. Although there is growing criticism of the "googlization" of websites, Google continues to be the standard by which most sites are judged. ”

“ The overall implications of the Internet for how we work and how we play are just beginning to be discussed and understood. The Internet is changing, or at the very least touching, people's lives in ways we have not imagined. ”

“ In general, the Internet has become so good at answering factual questions—the kinds of things you find in an almanac, an encyclopedia, or a phone book—that it is now usually better in terms of speed, timeliness, and accuracy than other resources. For example, if I need to know the world's largest hydroelectric plants, I can open an almanac and look up this information or I can type [world's largest hydroelectric plants] into Google, Yahoo, or Live Search, where the first result links me to a page at Information Please.com that contains the answer to the question. ”

“ Everyone wants convenience but it is a virtual axiom of technology that every increase in convenience brings with it some decrease in privacy and, most likely, security. Now more than ever, the future of search is one that appears to be heading towards more personalization, more features, more options and, inevitably it seems, less privacy, less security, and fewer companies with the will, technological know-how, and financial resources to build and maintain search engines. ”

“ The best approach may not be to type java into a search engine. Why? Because you'll probably get millions of hits, and the first ones may be to commercial sites trying to sell you something relating to Java and will undoubtedly also include other meanings of Java, such as Indonesia and coffee. If you are looking for general information on a topic, wikis, specialized (vertical) search engines, and virtual libraries are often better starting points for researching general or broad topics than big search engines.
The single biggest mistake searchers make is using the wrong search tool. ”

“ All the major search engines now index well over a billion pages of information. The problem generally isn't lack of data but finding that one tiny needle in a virtual haystack of almost limitless size (much like looking for a needle in a stack of needles) .
Any serious researcher needs to know more about search engines than the average person using the Net for fun or even for very specialized searches associated with a hobby or perhaps a certain topic, e.g.,. cancer research. How do you learn the ins and outs of search? ”

“ Among the best search engine-specific blogs are the Yahoo Search Blog, the Official Google Blog, Google Operating System, and Live Search Weblog.
The only thing predictable about search engines is how quickly and frequently they change not only their content but also their features. Because there are websites devoted to keeping up with the myriad changes, they are your best bet for staying on top of the ever-changing world of search tools. ”

“ Many if not most blogs make their content available in RSS.
Although there is no agreed upon definition of what Web 2.0 means, in general terms most people believe it involves at a minimum users collaborating to share information online, i.e., an interactive, participatory web in contrast to what is now being called the static web (or Web 1.0) . I think the Wikipedia article on Web 2.0 sums the current state of affairs up nicely when it says "To some extent Web 2.0 is a buzzword, incorporating whatever is newly popular on the Web (such as tags and podcasts) , and its meaning is still in flux. ”

“ And there are other trends in search that are going to have a major impact on users, love them or hate them. Among these are greater personalization of search, an area in which Google, Yahoo, and Live Search are all vying for your attention. Then there is the concept of social networking, through which Internet users with similar interests share their web knowledge and experience. Social bookmarking sites such as del.icio.us or digg and sharing software such as Stumbleupon are growing in popularity as individual users seek ways to help each other discover and propagate information. ”

“ While many smaller, focused search tools still exist, the sad fact is that, in terms of large, powerful, world-encompassing search engines, Internet searchers at this moment have fewer major search engines from which to choose. ”

“ The Past, Present, and Future of Search
"Search has become the most hotly contested field in the world of technology." [4]
Remember Northern Light? How about Excite, Galaxy, Lycos, HotBot, Magellan, InfoSpace, Go, Webcrawler, iWon, Netfind, or Webtop? If so, you've been searching the Internet a long time because many of these search engines are long gone and forgotten. However many changes in search and search engines have taken place in recent years, nothing has been quite so dramatic as what has occurred in the past two years with the appearance of the new Yahoo and Live Search engines. ”

“ You've thought through your research question and decided to use the Internet to find information either because you've already tried traditional sources without success or you believe the Internet is your best option. You're sitting in front of your terminal, you've logged onto the Internet and you're staring at a blank screen. Now what? Let's start with a (relatively) easy type of search. You need to find general information about a fairly broad topic. Let's say you need to research a broad topic unfamiliar to you, for example, Java. ”

“ I believe Yahoo's decision to metamorphose from directory to search engine was in part a result of a tacit recognition of the Tristram Shandy paradox. Yahoo just couldn't keep up with the Internet's changes and it became too costly to try. Creating and maintaining a directory is an extremely manpower intensive endeavor, which flies in the face of the Internet model of relying on automation and technology. Undoubtedly, Yahoo's changes were largely driven by Google's enormous financial success. ”

“ Search engines are not the only and often not even the best way to access information on the Internet.
Web Directories/Subject Guides/Portals
Web directories are organized subject catalogues that allow the web searcher to browse through lists of sites by subject in search of relevant information. Yahoo, Galaxy, Google Directory, Lycos, and the Open Directory are select lists of links to pertinent websites. Directories were once viewed as the future of the Internet because they could sift through the mountains of information and millions of websites to offer only the best and most relevant. ”

“ Subject guide databases are always smaller than those of search engines, which means that the number of hits returned tends to be smaller as well. On the bright side, this means the results directories produce are often more relevant. For example, while a search engine typically indexes every page of a given website, a subject guide is more likely to provide a link only to the site's home page. For this reason, they lend themselves best to searching for information about a general subject, rather than for a specific piece of information. ”

“ The search engine index, catalog, or database, where everything the spider found is stored; The search engine software that actually sifts through everything in the index to find matches and then ranks or sorts them into a list of results or hits. Important points to consider about search engines: Spiders are programmed to return to websites on a regular basis, but the time interval varies widely from engine to engine. Monthly or better is considered "fresh." When you use a search engine, you are searching the index or database, not the web pages themselves. ”

“ What distinguished the Open Directory from Yahoo was that, while Yahoo was heavily commercial, the Open Directory has always relied upon volunteers to populate and maintain it. Now that most of users' creative energy seems to have moved to wikis, the ODP is in what may be a permanent and ultimately fatal decline. Today, the most successful directories tend to be specialty directories such as NewsDirectory.com or yourDictionary.com, and vertical search engines, such as Business.com or MedlinePlus, which focus on a particular topic instead of trying to catalog the entire Internet. ”

“ Clusty also provides a number of advanced search options and preferences, including the option to add your own customized tabs to the main search page. Clusty stands out as one of—if not indeed—the best metasearch tools available for free and without registration on the Internet. When clustering works (and the Vivisimo technology was independently rated as accurate 90 percent of the time) , it offers advantages for automatically grouping huge amounts of information logically. ”

“ It is important to note that many metasearch engines do not employ some of the best search engines, such as Google and Yahoo. Also, my biggest complaint about metasearch engines is that they perform shallow searches, usually only retrieving the top ten or so hits from a site, which is far too few to be comprehensive or truly representative of what is "out there." ”

“ Many websites now serve as directories to help users find podcasts of every variety anywhere in the world. Podcasting has caught on because it is easy, inexpensive, mobile, flexible, and powerful. Yahoo got out in front of the podcasting trend with its new Podcasts Search site after a study the search giant published with Ipsos Insight, which disclosed that most of the people who are using RSS do so without even knowing it. ”

“ Because of Internet Explorer's continued dominance of the browser market and, more importantly, because it is the standard browser for many Untangling the Web readers, I will focus my attention on Internet Explorer.
Nonetheless, all browsers have advantages and drawbacks. I still recommend you configure two browsers, both Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox. Both types of browsers allow you to make a number of decisions that affect your privacy and security while browsing. ”

“ Directories continue to recede in importance and value to researchers as they are increasingly replaced by better alternatives, including Custom Search, by which a voluntary community of searchers shares expertise to create more focused searches with more relevant results. The reason for the decline of directories is obvious: directories are simply too manpower intensive and expensive to keep up with the ever-changing and expanding web. ”

“ Remember also that those who use the Internet to do harm, to spread fear, and to carry out crimes are like the mythical Minotaur who, as well as being the monster in the Minoan maze, was also its prisoner. ”

“ Megasearch sites simply store several search engines under one roof, but you have to do the searches one search engine at a time. They are becoming more sophisticated and better as time passes, serving as good entry points for finding and evaluating search engines. They are especially useful for locating international search engines. ”

“ Mankind, claims Freud, seems "to have observed that this newly-won power over space and time, this subjugation of the forces of nature, which is the fulfillment of a longing that goes back thousands of years, has not increased the amount of pleasurable satisfaction which they may expect from life and has not made them feel happier." [5] Indeed, most of the satisfactions derived from technology are analogous to the "cheap enjoyment...obtained by putting a bare leg from under the bedclothes on a cold winter night and drawing it in aqain." ”

“ If you are new to using search engines, these are a great way to do a very broad search, while familiarizing yourself with the popular engines and how they respond. But metasearch engines inevitably lack the flexibility of individual search tools. ”

“ The future of search seems to be in fewer but more experienced and more commercially driven hands now than a decade ago. Certainly both the quantity and quality of search results are much better today. ”

“ Podcasting is recording and broadcasting any non-musical information—be it news, radio shows, sporting events, audio tours, or personal opinions—usually in MP3 format for playback using a digital audio player. ”

“ RSS, which either stands for Rich Site Summary or Really Simple Syndication, is an XML format for news and content syndication. News aggregators are programs designed to read RSS formatted content, which is very popular in the blogging community. ”

“ The 100 million site milestone caps an extraordinary year in which the Internet has already added 27.4 million sites, easily topping the previous full-year growth record of 17 million from 2005. The Internet has doubled in size since May 2004, when the survey hit 50 million. ”