Masti Point

“The value you expect is always higher than the price paid and is also subjective, which is why the idea that using dollars to measure the “value” of search has in my opinion, ignored the elephant in the room.” – DGM atBrainchild

The Internet is one of the most impactful innovations in the recent past. The technology not only fulfils the desire for networking and information sharing but has also empowers people, while also strengthening democratic processes and systems. I feel the integration of the Internet with other communication technologies (such as mobile phones) has brought even more and different kinds, of value. We have already seen how the Internet has impacted people’s political movements in Yemen and other countries. I think the time has come for us deploy this technology in the service of larger problems like poverty and hunger. A lot has yet to be done to deploy this technology for the good of mankind.

At the same time, I think we should also take account of the hidden costs or company losses that search have created. With increased productivity there also comes the opportunity for increased personal searching, and the workplace time lost on social networks has clearly created some tough rules at organizations that are now banning such sites. Even further, I would say that too much choice is sometimes a bad thing. The early days of the Internet had a limited number of high-quality content sources. Although we have indeed moved to some sites with even higher-quality content, this has been countered to some extent by a deluge of low-quality, distracting sites that hamper effective, rapid search results. Sometimes I find it faster to search with images than words, as I can more quickly find interesting approaches to problems this way.

The quality of material returned by Internet search remains an issue. Not only does relevance rapidly fall off beyond page two or three, but the first-page results also raise quality issues for non-IT professional knowledge work, in terms of the information’s reliability: they should be concerned with the potential overreliance on external, unverified information. As the drive for greater efficiency and lower costs arguably reduces the ratio of experienced to inexperienced staff, and a new generation accustomed to “Googling” knowledge dominates the workplace, this problem will become acute. In many more traditional industries, I think there is also an imbalance between consumers of knowledge and producers of knowledge. Outside IT, many sectors are experiencing a shortfall in technical knowledge; yes, organizations can benefit hugely from search, but in more traditional industries I feel the content is lagging behind, in a potentially misleading way, and at the moment should be treated with caution.