Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
was Claire Duddy, and her workshop was a runaway success. Duddy
wrote in a subsequent article for
Serials
:
As a librarian (in-waiting) even the idea of a 'quick and dirty' search with
Google is an illicit thrill. It is almost too easy: shouldn't there be some
effort involved in finding useful, valid information? And if librarians use
Google, aren't we just undermining ourselves? It is a difficult thing then
to admit: Google is my first stop for all my information needs, whether I
am researching my dinner or my dissertation.
However, she went on to say:
Librarians who accept the importance of Google in their users' academic
lives are easier for users to relate to. They can also help to encourage
research that takes in a wide variety of sources and types of information.
We can promote internet searching and Google alongside more
traditional literature searching and A&I databases; the use of a wide
range of searching skills and information sources can be encouraged and
developed . . . the choice is not between Google and libraries. Both have
their strengths and weaknesses.
(Duddy, 2009)
We should be reassured that while Duddy does indeed start with
Google, she then goes on to utilize more specialist information retrieval
tools. However, there are clearly many students who do not. Professor
Tara Brabazon from Brighton University has coined the phrase 'Google
is white bread for the mind':
Google offers easy answers to difficult questions. But students do not
know how to tell if they come from serious refereed work or are merely
composed of shallow ideas, superficial surfing and fleeting commitment.
(Frean, 2008)
Brabazon is undoubtedly correct. However, there is another important
factor when considering the effectiveness of a Google search - and the
figures are staggering. Williams estimates that 'the surface web is about
177 terabytes while the total web is about 91,000 terabytes, so the total
web has 500 times more content than is openly accessible' (Williams,
2009).
