Search and Serendipity: Finding More When You Know Less
Search Engine Land just published my article: Search & Serendipity: Finding More When You Know Less. Here is an excerpt:
Where do you go to get your daily fix of fresh information? If you are like millions of other users out there, you hit sites like Digg, Delicious, Techmeme, or just open your favorite RSS reader. Or, you tap into your Stumbleupon toolbar to see what your fellow Stumblers have found interesting lately. Most people don’t automatically think of search as a place for serendipitous exploration. Search is best when you have something specific in mind, right?
Actually, search has been evolving a lot lately. And, as we seek new and better means of disambiguating intent, the search engines are increasingly offering richer media and information that feels a lot more dynamic and exploratory.