Google and Going Beyond Search
Stephen Arnold writes:
The idea for this blog began when I worked through selected Ramanathan Guha patent documents. I have analyzed these in my 2007 Google Version 2. If you are not familiar with them, you may want to take a moment, download these items, and read the “background” and “claims” sections of each. Here are several filings I found interesting:
US2007 003 8600
US2007 003 8601
US2007 003 8603
US2007 003 8614
US2007 003 8616The utility of Dr. Guha’s invention is roughly similar to the type of question answering supported by WolframAlpha. However, there are a number of significant differences. I have explored these in the chapter in The Google Legacy “Google and the Programmable Search Engine.”
I read with interest the different explanations of Google’s most recent enhancement to its search results page. I am not too eager to highlight “Introducing the Knowledge Graph: Things, Not Strings” because it introduces terminology which is more poetic and metaphorical than descriptive. Nevertheless, you will want to take a look at how Google explains its “new” approach. Keep in mind that some of the functions appear in patent documents and technical papers which date from 2006 or earlier. The question this begs is, “Why the delay?” Is the roll out strategic in that it will have an impact on Facebook at a critical point in the company’s timeline or is it evidence that Google experiences “big company friction” when it attempts to move from demonstration to production implementation of a mash up variant.
First, we have hyperlinks for a reason, to make it easier on readers to follow references (among others).
So, the patents that Stephen cites above:
- US2007 003 8600 Missing. Cited in numerous patents with a hyperlink but the USPTO returns no patent.
- US2007 003 8601 Aggregating context data for programmable search engines
- US2007 003 8603 Sharing context data across programmable search engines
- US2007 003 8614 Generating and presenting advertisements based on context data for programmable search engines
- US2007 003 8616 Missing. Cited in numerous patents with a hyperlink but the USPTO returns no patent.
Three out of five? I wonder what Stephen was reading for the two that are missing?
BTW, Stephen concludes:
So Google has gone beyond search. The problem is that I don’t want to go there via the Google, Bing, or any other intermediary’s intellectual training wheels. I want to read, think, decide, and formulate my view. In short, I like the dirty, painful research process.
I fully understand running materials “back to the sources” as it were. As a student, lawyer, bible scholar, standards editor, bystander to semantic drive-bys, etc.
But one goal of research is to blaze trails that others can follow, so they can dig deeper than we could.
Google has hardly eliminated the need for research, unless it is a very superficial type of research. And that hardly merits the name research.