Search results

To describe a small‐scale quantitative evaluation of the scholarly information search engine, Google Scholar.

Google Scholar's ability to retrieve scholarly information was compared to that of three popular search engines: Ask.com, Google and Yahoo! Test queries were presented to all four search engines and the following measures were used to compare them: precision; Vaughan's Quality of Result Ranking; relative recall; and Vaughan's Ability to Retrieve Top Ranked Pages.

Significant differences were found in the ability to retrieve top ranked pages between Ask.com and Google and between Ask.com and Google Scholar for scientific queries. No other significant differences were found between the search engines. This may be due to the relatively small sample size of eight queries. Results suggest that, for scientific queries, Google Scholar has the highest precision, relative recall and Ability to Retrieve Top Ranked Pages. However, it achieved the lowest score for these three measures for non‐scientific queries. The best overall score for all four measures was achieved by Google. Vaughan's Quality of Result Ranking found a significant correlation between Google and scientific queries.

As with any search engine evaluation, the results pertain only to performance at the time of the study and must be considered in light of any subsequent changes in the search engine's configuration or functioning. Also, the relatively small sample size limits the scope of the study's findings.

These results suggest that, although Google Scholar may prove useful to those in scientific disciplines, further development is necessary if it is to be useful to the scholarly community in general.

This is a preliminary study in applying the accepted performance measures of precision and recall to Google Scholar. It provides information specialists and users with an objective evaluation of Google Scholar's abilities across both scientific and non‐scientific disciplines and paves the way for a larger study.

Strategic management research has shown growing interest in understanding the dynamic resource reconfiguration processes through which firms grow, evolve, and sustain profitability. The goal of our study is to understand how dynamic resource reconfigurations enable firms to pursue growth opportunities. We use the methods of inductive theory building from case studies to elaborate current theoretical understanding about how firms draw on both internal and external resources in the pursuit of growth. We examine the patterns of resource reconfigurations through which Yahoo and Google powered their early growth strategies in their first 10 years of existence. We analyze a total of 192 new product launches in 43 markets by the two firms to capture how they reconfigured resources dynamically. Our analysis reveals that both firms developed highly dynamic strategies exhibiting both surprising similarities and differences. These similarities and differences provided the basis for our theoretical insights about the development of what we term “dynamic resource platforms,” comprising of (a) dynamic resource shifts; (b) targeted resource orchestration; and (c) complementary processes balancing dynamism and capability development. These ideas contribute novel theoretical insights to current strategic management research on dynamic capabilities and on resource reconfiguration and redeployment.

This paper aims to demonstrate the role that the Google general search engine plays in the information‐seeking behaviour of scientists, particularly physicists and astronomers.

The paper is based on a mixed‐methods study including 56 semi‐structured interviews, a questionnaire survey of 114 respondents (47 per cent response rate) and the use of information‐event cards to collect critical incident data. The study was conducted at the Department of Physics and Astronomy at University College, London.

The results show that Google is the tool most used for problem‐specific information seeking. The results also show the growing reliance of scientists on general search engines, particularly Google, for finding scholarly articles. Initially, finding scholarly articles was a by‐product of general searching for information rather than focused searches for papers. However, a growing number of articles read by scientists are identified through the Google general search engine and, as scientists are becoming more aware of the quantity of scholarly papers searchable by Google, they are increasingly relying on Google for finding scholarly literature.

As the only fields covered in the study were physics and astronomy, and the research participants were sourced from just one department of one institution, caution should be taken in generalising the findings.

The data are based on a mixed‐methods in‐depth study of scientists' information‐seeking behaviour which sheds some light on a question raised in past studies relating to the reason for the high number of articles identified through Google.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the ethical implications of Google's Knowledge Graph. The paper argues that in the advent and implementation of said Knowledge Graph, the role of Google in users' lives and the power held by Google as the key intermediary of information must be scrutinized.

Revisiting existing literature on Google and its impact on knowledge culture, the paper seeks to assess whether the implementation of The Knowledge Graph represents a significant shift in the nature (or use) of the service.

The paper concludes that the extension to Google Search, The Knowledge Graph, can serve to radicalize Google's position as a key intermediary of information in users' lives. Rather than simply serving as a gatekeeper supplying the user with an array of links matching a given query, Google now conveniently disseminates information on their own site, roughly rendering the remainder of the web superfluous. Considering both the commercial nature and the opacity of the service, Google as a de facto solo editor of information is worrying from both a democratic and ethical perspective. A culture of emphatic insistence on convenience and consumption is likely to contribute to the impediment of autonomous information retrieval and digital literacy.

The paper must be considered a preliminary inquiry into Google's reliability as an editor of the body of knowledge. As of yet, no literature specifically has remarked on The Knowledge Graph.

This paper examines whether the newest extension of Google Search, The Knowledge Graph, poses any significant changes to the assessment of the service and its role in the culture. Fostering critical, digital literacy in search engine users is deemed of even more vital importance to society with the implementation of The Knowledge Graph. This paper, preliminary and far from exhaustive, seeks to initiate a discussion on the future responsibilities of Google, scholars and users in securing the ideal of critical digital literacy.

The purpose of this paper is to create knowledge on how Google and Google search are discursively constructed as a political subject suitable or not suitable for governing in the debate regarding the Right to be Forgotten ruling (RTBF).

A total of 28 texts are analysed using a Foucauldian discourse analysis focussing on political problematisations in the media and in blogs.

Google is conceptualised as a commercial company, a neutral facilitator of the world and as a judge of character. The discourse makes visible Google’s power over knowledge production. The individual being searched is constructed as a political object that is either guilty or innocent, invoking morality as a part of the policy. The ruling is framed as giving individuals power over companies, but the power still lies within Google’s technical framework.

The ruling opens up an empirical possibility to critically examine Google. The value of the study is the combination of focus on Google as a political subject and the individual being searched to understand how Google is constructed in the discourse.

This paper is concerned with the current decision of the European Commission regarding Google’s comparison shopping service (Google Shopping). In 2017, the Commission has fined Google €2.42 billion for abusing its dominant position as a search engine by giving illegal advantage to Google Shopping. Consequently, Google has to stop its illegal conduct. In particular, the decision requires Google to treat rival comparison shopping services and its own service equally. The purpose of this paper is to analyse the decision from a perspective of two-sided markets. Google Shopping is an integrated service of Google Search and acts as an intermediary between companies, offerings products in the internet and people searching for products in the internet. This complies with the typical conditions of a two-sided market. From the perspective of sellers of goods and services in Europe, Google may be seen as a gatekeeper to the potential customers and thus as an essential facility. In the light of the current decision, this paper provides a possible regulation alternative. It is shown that Google Shopping represents a typical club good, so that welfare-optimising rules must be adhered to. In this context, it should be noted that in the current Google Shopping search results, artificial rivalry is created among sellers so as to ensure maximum willingness to pay for a top listing. The solution proposed in this paper entails a summary score list of all sellers of a particular product, for which a turnover-dependent contribution should be required, instead of a reduced score list, where positions are sold by auctions.

This paper uses methods of two-sided markets and public good theory.

It is shown that Google Shopping represents a typical club good, so that welfare-optimising rules must be adhered to. In this context, it should be noted that in the current Google Shopping search results, artificial rivalry is created among sellers so as to ensure maximum willingness to pay for a top listing. The solution proposed in this paper entails a summary score list of all sellers of a particular product, for which a turnover-dependent contribution should be required, instead of a reduced score list, where positions are sold by auctions.

To the best of the author’s knowledge, it is the very first paper about the decision of the European Union (06/2017) concerning Google Shopping.

The aim of this paper is to develop a methodology for assessing search results retrieved from different sources.

This is a two phase method, where in the first stage users select and rank the ten best search results from a randomly ordered set. In the second stage they are asked to choose the best pre‐ranked result from a set of possibilities. This two‐stage method allows users to consider each search result separately (in the first stage) and to express their views on the rankings as a whole, as they were retrieved by the search provider. The method was tested in a user study that compared different country‐specific search results of Google and Live Search (now Bing). The users were Israelis and the search results came from six sources: Google Israel, Google.com, Google UK, Live Search Israel, Live Search US and Live Search UK. The users evaluated the results of nine pre‐selected queries, created their own preferred ranking and picked the best ranking from the six sources.

The results indicate that the group of users in this study preferred their local Google interface, i.e. Google succeeded in its country‐specific customisation of search results. Live Search was much less successful in this aspect.

Search engines are highly dynamic, thus the findings of the case study have to be viewed cautiously.

The main contribution of the paper is a two‐phase methodology for comparing and evaluating search results from different sources.

Seeks to describe library federated search engines MetaLib and WebFeat as research tools by comparing MetaLib with WebFeat and by highlighting their strengths and weaknesses against Google and Google Scholar.

This study tested MetaLib and WebFeat from various libraries; attended vendor demos and asked vendors questions; reviewed literature; and interviewed system administrators of MetaLib and WebFeat.

MetaLib and WebFeat have fundamental differences between them. They cannot compete with Google in speed, simplicity, ease of use, and convenience, nor can they be truly one‐stop shopping. Their strengths lie in the contents they search as well as in the objective way they retrieve and display results. With the federated search engines, information literacy education is still relevant.

The comprehensive comparisons of MetaLib and WebFeat from the perspectives of both users and system administrators are original. It helps libraries make decisions when they select federated search engines, and it gives libraries realistic expectations of federated search engines compared with Google.

This paper aims to conduct a review of the literature published, between 2006 and 2018, that used search engine data on tourism and hospitality research, namely, Google Insights for Search and Google Trends. More specifically, it intends to identify the purpose and context of the data use, ascertaining the main findings and reviewing the methodological approaches.

A systematic literature review of Scopus indexed research has been carried out. Given the novelty of search engine data use in tourism and hospitality research and the relatively low number of search results in Scopus, other databases were used to broaden the scope of analysis, namely, EBSCO and Google Scholar. The papers selected were subjected to content and statistical analyses.

Google Trends data use in tourism and hospitality research has increased significantly from 2012 to 2017, mainly for tourism forecasting/nowcasting; knowing the interest of users’ searches for tourist attractions or destinations; showing the relationship between the official tourism statistics and the search volume index of Google Trends; and estimating the effect of one event on tourism demand. The categories and search terms used vary with the purpose of the study; however, they mostly focus on the travel category and use the country as the search term.

Google Trends has been increasingly used in research publications in tourism and hospitality, but the range of its applications and methods used has not yet been reviewed. Therefore, a systematic review of the existing literature increases awareness of its potential uses in tourism and hospitality research and facilitates a better understanding of its strengths and weaknesses as a research tool.

本文回顾2006年至2018年发表文献使用酒店旅游相关的搜索引擎数据, 即Google Insights for Search 以及Google Trends。确切地说, 本文旨在研究数据使用目的和背景, 归纳主要研究成果和研究方法。

本文采用Scopus索引, 由于旅游酒店领域使用搜索引擎数据的文献较少, Scopus搜索结果样本量较低, 本文扩展到其他数据库, 即EBSCO以及Google Scholar。选定的样本文献采用文本分析和统计分析法。

旅游酒店领域中对Google Trends数据使用的增加主要集中在2012年到2017年, 主要研究领域有（1）旅游预测/即时预报；（2）了解用户搜索旅游景点或目的地的需求；（3）官方旅游数据和Google Trends搜索量索引之间的关系；以及（4）评估大事件对旅游需求的影响。文献归类和搜索名词根据研究目的而不同。然而, 大多数文章使用‘旅游’归类以及使用国家作为搜索关键词。

Google Trends在酒店旅游领域研究中的使用逐渐增加, 但是据作者所知, 其应用的范畴和方法仍处在起步阶段。因此, 对现有文献的系统回顾可以提高对其在旅游酒店领域中应用的认知, 并且本文结果使其作为研究工具的优劣分析更深理解。

Google Trends, Google insights for search, 搜索引擎数据, 旅游酒店研究, 系统文献回顾

The purpose of this paper is to explore informational structures producing and organising the construction of waste sorting in Sweden. It shows how the issue is constructed by it being searched for in Google and how this contributes to the specific informational texture of waste sorting in Sweden. It is guided by the following questions: who are the main actors and which are the central topics featuring in Google results on popular, suggested searches for waste sorting in Sweden? What do the link relations between these tell the author about the issue space that is formed around waste sorting in Sweden? How is the construction of the notions of waste sorting and waste shaped in the information available through Google’s features for related and other relevant searches?

Waste sorting is discussed as a practice structured along moral rules and as a classification exercise. The study brings together two types of material, results from searches carried out in Google and lists of Google query suggestions for relevant search terms. These are analysed with a mixed method approach, uniting quantitative network analysis and qualitative content analysis of query suggestions. A sociomaterial approach theoretically grounds the analysis.

Waste sorting in Sweden emerges as an issue that is characterised by dense networks of rules and regulation, focused in public authorities and government agencies, which in turn address consumers, waste management businesses and other authorities. Search engine use and waste sorting in Sweden are shown to be joined together in various mundane everyday life practices and practices of governance that become visible through the search engine in form of search results and suggested searches. The search engine is shown to work as a fluid classification system, which is also created and shaped by its use.

The study offers a novel methodological approach to studying the informational structures of an issue and of its shaping through it being searched for. The sociomaterially grounded analysis of Google as a fluid classification system is original.