Google's Search Engine for Blogs

This week, Google unveiled their new blog search engine. I heard someone refer to it as "Bloogle" which I think is what they ought to call it. (OK, maybe not -- a chilling vision has just flashed through my mind of Tim Kazurinsky holding up a series of cards and saying "A search engine for cows -- Moogle. A search engine for St. Louis -- St. Lougle. A search engine for model trains -- Choo-Choogle. A search engine for synagogues -- Jewgle" and so on.) (However, if Google ever gets into the business of providing adult content, I have just the name for them: "Go Ogle.")

Here's what the Motley Fool has to say about it. Excerpt:

Interestingly enough, I used the Google blog-search service to get a sense of the buzz on the new product. And I found that there are a variety of criticisms. First, the Google service indexes blogs only back to March 2005. What's more, Google does not seem to do a good job of weeding out spam blog posts.

But as is the case with other Google services, the smart programmers at the company will continue to improve the functionality. It will certainly be inspired to do so because of the coming competition from Yahoo! and Microsoft, both of which are supposed to launch their own blog-search services soon.

This is bad news for pure-play blog-search companies, such as Technorati, but it's very good for people like me who increasingly rely on the value of blog content.

Here's some of what Technorati says about Google's new service:

I welcome the competition. We've got some tricks up our sleeves too - and there's no doubt that in the end, the competition will end up producing more innovation and better services for bloggers and readers.

Welcome to the party, Google!

Also, I'm looking forward to reading John Battelle's new book "The Search: How Google and Its Rivals Rewrote the Rules of Business and Transformed Our Culture" even though it may be an example of the trend towards subtitular grandiosity about which I have blogged in the past. But then again, search engines are so important to our information-based economy (we use them all the time at work), that it may not!

Here's an interesting excerpt from one of Battelle's blogposts:

Last night at a book event at Books Inc in Mountain View, a fellow asked me a question that made me think - in short, he asked why there was so much useless information on the web. Put another way, he was expressing frustration with search results - so often we can't find what we are looking for. I responded that - while it's possible he might not like this answer - we as users of search need to get better at searching. And by that I don't mean smarter about how to use advanced features, or how to find the perfect query, but rather at critical thinking, at reviewing and critiquing a set of results, learning from what is and is not there, and refining our searches as a result. And that the only way that is going to happen is if our educational system values critical thinking skills over rote testing.