I recorded the first video podcast for iGary today and here it is. A bit of a test really.
In this episode I take a quick look at Google’s Searchwiki, launched 20th November 2008 which allows logged in users to personalise search results on Google.
It looks like this:
Google SearchWiki Buttons
You can move the result up, down or delete it completely from the results. You also get the option to leave a comment.
So, 4 months on have people engaged with it? has it gained traction?
To test this I thought I’d take a look at a generic search phrase with high volume and one that stirs a bit of feeling, good and bad, because if this phrase doesn’t spur people to take action what will? The phrase? George Bush.
To see what has happened you just search and then scroll to the bottom of the results page, you will then see these links.
Check SearchWiki Results
Click the ’see all notes for this searchwiki’ link and it will take you to a page that shows all comments made, how many times the result has been moved (up/down) and how many times it has been removed.
George’s looks like this:
Not Many Notes
As you can see just 133 notes, not many for someone who stirs a few emotions over the pond.
The conclusion I came to is that people just don’t want to do Google’s job for them or the results are so relevant already there isn’t much to do!