Comments on: Video: Dr. Joshua Schwimmer on Google Book Search

By: Mark Wentz

Mark Wentz — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 02:56:59 +0000

Sorry. Just a failed reference to the East coast/ West coast hip hop feud of several years ago. Wikipedia Hip Hop rivalry entry

By: David Rothman

David Rothman — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 17:37:12 +0000

Mark-

Huh?

-David

By: Mark Wentz

Mark Wentz — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 03:41:29 +0000

This East Coast / West Coast library bloggers rivalry is getting intense! I’m now afraid to attend Wii tournaments for fear a getting caught in the crossfire.

Peace out, blawgs!

By: David Rothman

David Rothman — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 00:39:20 +0000

As I wrote in my first post about Google Book Search (linked in the first sentence of the post above), that was my experience as well. I was thinking of a particular passage from Strunk and White’s Elements of Style and was able to pull up the passage in seconds.

I found that pretty significantly useful. In similar circumstances, I’d certainly try it again.

By: Dean Giustini

Dean Giustini — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 00:31:11 +0000

David,
I am just trying to figure out how you view this video. It seems to me that the crux of the matter is that when Dr. Schwimmer was searching for necrotizing fasciitis he was doing a “known-item” search – ‘a needle in a haystack’. He knew exactly what he was looking for including the book title and author.

I am diggin’ the fact that we have this capability but can’t imagine other than browsing and pinpoint searching where GBS would be useful.

C’est tout
Dean

By: David Rothman

David Rothman — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 22:51:16 +0000

My apologies, Dean. You asked questions I failed to answer. You asked:

Is Dr. Schwimmer’s search example of “flesh eating disease” typical of most searches?

I have no way of knowing- there’s no data available to indicate what is or isn’t typical.

As for what type of search it is, I’m not sure what you’re asking. If you run the search shown in the video in Google Book Search, you’ll see the results Dr. Schwimmer saw.

By: David Rothman

David Rothman — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 22:46:34 +0000

Hi Dean-

The previous post on this topic was explicit in mentioning that I have found Google Book Search useful and that I don’t yet understand why some libraryfolk get bent out-of-shape about it.

In this video, Dr. Schwimmer again relates his experience and his positive view of Google Book Search’s usefulness to clinicians. That a physician holds this view and expresses it on video for Google is, in itself, worthy of mention and sharing.

But I might just as well ask why you sometimes post items with just a couple of descriptive remarks. Recent examples include Web 3.0 as “Global Information Commons’ and We need librarian aerobics 1.0.

But you and I have been over this ground before. I believe that there is significant value simply in pointing out interesting items and resources and am selective about the topics on which I editorialize. Your beliefs differ. That’s great, though- viva la difference! I don’t have to agree with you in order to enjoy your blog and recommend it to others. What fun would the blogosphere be without a variety of perspectives?

By: Dean Giustini

Dean Giustini — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 21:31:43 +0000

David,

Thank you for pointing out the video.

I like your blog but I’m always curious when you don’t/ why you don’t comment on the information you post.

Do you see anything critical in the video? Is Dr. Schwimmer’s search example of “flesh eating disease” typical of most searches?

What type of search is that by the way?

Dean