[Web4lib] Google search results question

[Hester, Mary]

 I became intrigued by this and did a quick "ask a librarian" in several
search engines.

Google: said there were 6,010,000  but actually only went to 925 before
ended; when did the "results omitted" said there were 5,970,000 but
actually only went to 1000 before ending.
Vivisimo: only went to 214 results of "at least 855,953"  and didn't see
a place to search "results omitted".
Yahoo: said there were 6,220,000 but would only go to 1000. When did the
"results omitted" said there were 5,880,000 but again only went to 1000
Teoma: Said there were 571,500 but only went to 198, did not see a place
to search "results omitted".
Clusty: said there were 855,951 but only retrieved 222, did not see a
place to search "results omitted".
 
This in one of those things I could spend hours on so I made myself quit
after five search engines.

Mary Hester
Barton County Community College Library Great Bend, KS 67530
hesterm at bartonccc.edu 



Mary Hester 
Barton County Community College Library 
Great Bend, KS 67530 
hesterm at bartonccc.edu 




-----Original Message-----
From: web4lib-bounces at webjunction.org
[mailto:web4lib-bounces at webjunction.org] On Behalf Of Sloan, Bernie
Sent: Wednesday, July 06, 2005 1:25 PM
To: Drew, Bill
Cc: web4lib at webjunction.org
Subject: RE: [Web4lib] Google search results question

Here's how I stumbled across it...

In the second example I originally gave (searching for "ask a
librarian") I was trying to get a handle for how many virtual reference
services might be out there. So I decided to try several searches, and
"ask a librarian" was my first search. I found out the number of
services calling themselves "ask a librarian" was somewhere between 965
and 5,850,000. Not quite precise enough for my purposes! :-)

By the way, the number of results for the "ask a librarian" search has
increased by 160,000 since yesterday.

-----Original Message-----
From: Drew, Bill [mailto:drewwe at MORRISVILLE.EDU]
Sent: Wednesday, July 06, 2005 9:02 AM
To: Jeremy Dunck; Felicia Mehl
Cc: Sloan, Bernie; web4lib at webjunction.org
Subject: RE: [Web4lib] Google search results question

Dumb question, but why does it matter if the numbers are accurate or
not?  Are you doing statistical studies?  What matters is the results
not the counts.

Bill Drew
drewwe at morrisville.edu

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