On Sun, 1 Oct 2000, Stevan Harnad wrote:
> On Sun, 1 Oct 2000, Eric Hellman wrote:
> [...]
> > Google is uncanny. For example, it knows to classify "Harnad" in the
> > category "Logic and Ontology:Natural Kinds".
>
> It's interesting that it got that, based on linkedness, but that is in
> fact far from being the best or most useful first-cut classification of
> my work. It is no doubt an artifact of the linkedness-ranking. If you
> did it in the refereed sector, using citation linking, you would get
> much more accurate and useful categories.
> [...]
While I agree that Google is uncanny, the abovementioned classification is
not the result of linkedness, but the result of Google's partnering with
the Netscape Open Directory Project <
http://dmoz.org>.
One of the biggest weaknesses of Web search engines such as Google is
their inability to delve into a database or textbase. In fact, they are
limited, by and large, to plain text and plain HTML, and are unable to
read files in PostScript, PDF, MSWord, etc., or even HTML pages with
frames, ASP, or wide use of Javascript.
Thus, many scholarly text projects are invisible to search engines.
David Sitman
Tel Aviv University
Received on Mon Jan 24 2000 - 19:17:43 GMT