Weeek 4, # 9: A Few of My (Not So) Favorite Things

I tried several of the sites listed here: Technorati (which is revered by tons of techie people I know), Syndica8, Moreover, Topix, BlogPulse, Google Alerts, Bloglines search and Google Blog search.

My favorite would have to be Google Alerts. For the past 4 days, I've had Google Alerts feeding me info via email on articles on the Isle of Capri (Italy). I prefer this type of topic searching to the broader site searching on services such as Bloglines. I did find myself listed in a few blogs (presentation summaries) that I hadn't seen before. It took me by surprise.

Topix seemed to have potential to be a localized, more personal Ebsco Host type search interface. It pulled from a wide variety of local sources so provided more perspectives than simply doing a search on our small local newspaper. However, the comments with the articles were, to be blunt, inane. One obituary on a local paster had a reader comment posted from a woman whose husband left her for another woman and later committed suicide--all with first and last names for all the people involved. As far as I could see, the comment had no connection to the article. This happened several times. Topix also encouraged readers to apply to be an editor, a position which allows one to edit the stories, ala Wikipedia. If the editing is anything like the commenting, articles would have no credibility. I think Yahoo's "Local" feature did a better job of gathering mainstream stories on my region from the news sources than did Topix because the comment section in Topix is distracting. I will say that Topix was able to pinpoint the small town news better. Yahoo found news from the larger city 15 miles away

And speaking of credibility.... An issue we should consider is the credibility of Web 2.0 information, especially now that Google has begun to include blogs in its search results.

Would I use any of these with my students? So far these wouldn't be top priority lessons. D