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Web Searches. Inspired by The Web Feet Guide to Finding it on the Net, Sept. 2000 (©RockHill Communications; www.webfeeguildes.com) Here is a list of some of the search engines available on the web for your use along with a brief description of its usefulness. About.com - for in depth info on broad topics, Has more than 50,000 topics. Altavista - largest search engine. Can search for images, sounds and video as well as web pages. Ask Jeeves - type in your question in plain English. Dogpile - finds the top 10 results from 18 search engines. Excite - a small datbase that allows you to personalize your search page. Google - searches for exact matches of your phrase, or only those in close proximity to your phrase. Also gives street map of any US street address. GoTo - advertisers pay to be listed in this search engine; they more they pay, the higher they get listed in your search result. This makes for a focused search uncluttered by advertisements. HotBot - Nice set of features for more specific kinds of seraches - date, language, imae, video, date, exact phrases and so forth. Looksmart - Similar to Yahoo! has easy to use subject categories. You can get free search assistance from LookSmart Live!, but you have to register. Once registered, you type in a question and you (may) get an email response. Northern Light - clusters your results in folder format. You get free summaries of articles from newspapers and magazines, butyou may be to pay for full text of the article. Yahoo! - good for general searches. Searches give links to sites and Yahoo! categories To create a search phrase, a few rules may be useful: If you want a whole phrase, such as Monty Python, put the phrase in quotes, so the engine searches for both words together... "Monty Python" If you want to do a search that DEFINITELY includes a word, put a "+" in front of it. If you don't want a word, then put a "-" in front of it. For example, if you want to find out about pythons (the snake) but not Monty Python, you could put +python -Monty |
Evaluating the Source:
When you find what looks like a good match, try to figure out who is providing the web page. If you are studying global warming, you might do a search. Let's try one. Assignment #1: a) Go to Google.com and type in "Global Warming" and view the first few web sites that come up. What are the sources of this information? b) What are the basic ideas promoted in these sites? c) What do you think of the credibility of these sources? d) Now, again from Google.com, add to the end of your search line (which had "global warming" ) the words "Rush Limbaugh". Now look at what you get. Read the sources. e) What are the basic ideas promoted in these sites? f) What do you think of the credibility of these sources?
There are many different points of view on many given subjects. The internet gives you the opportunity to use your education, reading ability, values and critical thinking ability to decide what is worth listening to and what isn't. Anybody can set up a web site with information on any subject.
Assignment #2: Your employer wants to know (1) the name of the "Baby Bell" companies and (2) how many wired and wireless telephone customers Verizon Communications corp has. Find this information.
Assignment #3: Pick a search engine and answer the following: Who is Pat Robertson? Find some information that refutes (does not agree with) his views and summarize it in a few sentences. Then find some information that supports his views and again summarize. Your summary should provide the source of your information and your evaluation of that source. |
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