Michael Fitzgerald wrote:
> Last week I was almost (but not quite) amused by the fact that Google
> doesn't know the difference between a biography and a bibliography,
> in several searches similar to:
>
> dotson bibliography
>
> but not all (I assume there is a threshold or something when it kicks
> in). But really - that's silly. There's not even a "Did you mean?"
> when it does this.
Larry Page will be viewing this as a minor imperfection, to be tolerated
while we are on the road towards the "Ultimate search engine". He
characterized it like this:
"The ultimate search engine would understand everything in the world.
It would understand everything that you asked it and give you back the
exact right thing instantly."
Now I'm almost sure Page well knows well enough this is an unattainable
ideal. (Ask yourself how far his current product is away from that.)
But his audience (the world at large) gladly takes it for a promise
or a forecast. And this means that henceforth everything put on the
search market will be measured against that ideal - doomed from the
start to be found seriously flawed.
We need some sober thinking about what's possible and what not.
Or just sit back and wait for Page to deliver - for in that event
everything else will be obliterated and our current efforts all
in vain. OTOH, according to some religions, there is only one
omniscient entity in the universe. So they have to decide whether
Page is that entity (or a close ally with access to the knowledge base)
or an heretic.
B. Eversberg
Received on Tue Aug 07 2007 - 05:56:51 EDT