i202 Fall 2010 School of Information, UC Berkeley

The article “Hard-Coding Bias in Google "Algorithmic" Search Results”, by Harvard professor Benjamin Edelmen, presents strong evidence that Google is intentionally manipulating search results despite promises to the contrary.

Most IR research has been focused on static information retrieval as if we are retrieving information from physical and digital libraries, and those techniques are what we have learned as part of this course. However, increasingly, researchers have become interested in the dynamic and temporal nature of information on the Web.

Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/16/business/media/16adco.html?_r=1&ref=te...

Other than a traditional search box for information retrieval, it is not a new idea to employ much richer user interfaces such as voice search, or visual search.

A year ago, Google introduced a smartphone application that lets users take photos of objects and get search results in return. Now they start testing water by working with five national brands to see how consumers interact with a brand.

Is Qwiki the multimedia search engine of the future?

For those of you in Section C, you may recall when Rami mentioned that a startup named Qwiki, working on a multimedia information retrieval service, had won the grand prize of the venture competition at the TechCrunch Disrupt Conference.

They have now moved into alpha, allowing testers to use their system and provide feedback. You can request an invite at http://www.qwiki.com or email me for one.

What is Qwiki?

Google recently revealed an overhaul of its back-end web indexing infrastructure, called Caffeine, making search results “50 percent fresher”. The old system was split into layers that did a series of batch processes on new Web content.

If you have an experience using touch-screen devices such as cellphone, e-book readers, or ATM, you might be a person who is awkward or clumsy to manipulate some electronic devices which are not equipped with touching screens. Nowadays, it is so natural that people try to touch the screen when they grab a brand-new mobile device because touching screens has seeped into their daily lives.

While the whole world is going crazy over social networking, how can Apple be behind? Steve Jobs has taken it upon himself to make people think of Apple, as a Social networking company, on the lines of Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare and others. But will Apple succeed in changing people's mindsets? Only time will tell, meanwhile, check out the powerful list of social media offerings by Apple: