Week # 8 Search Engines

It has been interesting trying out new search engines.  I was aware of Google's tendency to accept payment to put various sites higher up the food chain so to speak.

Working in a Secondary school, the first inclination of the students is to 'Google it' - and they are convinced if they just stay on Google long enough, it will all be provided for them.  They have trouble even conceiving the idea that it may not be there.  It is always there - how can I possibly suggest otherwise?  Use a book - what medieval century did I arrive from?

My favourite out of these was Blekko - the spam free engine.  It was quick and simple to use and didn't even blink when I tried out a Boolean search on it - whereas Twurdy just quit on me.  Twurdy took forever to respond to search enquiries and often just presented me with a blank page instead of results.

Kngine was just an app - so I need to download it onto my Galaxy Tablet and give it a try.  It looked very similar to the searching app on a friends iPhone - Seri, I think it is called.

Qwiki lost me very quickly - it appeared to be a presentation program rather than a search engine.  Podscope I couldn't get into at all - just 'Page not found'.  Wolfram Alpha I had seen before but it is very hard to search.  I found it was brilliant at maths queries but little else, I think.

Dewey Digger was way too complicated, even for a Librarian who knows Dewey - or maybe it is just me with little patience.  Not something I would use with the students.

We are currently overhauling our Library and Research classes and I will be including Blekko in our section on Web skills - and possibly Kngine if I can download it onto the iPads.

Others I have used at school which are not too bad are:  Quintura Kids and Sweetsearch both of which are fairly easy to use:

http://quinturakids.com/ - cloud type search engine 

http://www.sweetsearch.com/ - search engine designed for students.

Both are worth having a look at - especially if you work in a school environment.

Another one that I use regularly at home is Copernic - which is a search engine that searches multiple search engines.  I can't use it at school as the network blocks it - but it is my usual 'go-to' search engine at home.