Why a Search Engine Company Needs to Fix LexisNexis

Most of us, at this point, especially people my age and younger, take searching on the Internet for granted. We've grown up with the technology, we have little issue with freely posting information (damning or not) for the world to see and generally assumed that if we type in keywords into a box, we'll get the results we want.

If you go to law school, you'll be given access to the well-known legal research tool called Lexis-Nexis, which will remain your archaic friend for as long as you pursue a legal career. And within your first few minutes of training, you'll discover that Lexis-Nexis is a horrible search tool by today's technology standards. You have to memorize a list of archaic commands, commands that used to be second nature when you had to use the library computer to figure out where on particular book was located in the millions of stacks. But, you have to string the commands together just right in order to get the result you want, which takes practice and lots of trial and error. And that is assuming you have started your search in the correct category.

Needless to say, finding anything in Lexis-Nexis is a time-consuming, tedious task. But as it is the definitive research tool used by the legal profession, using it is a necessity. And since technology permeates so much of the world today, and as the legal staffs of technology companies continue to expand, I am surprised that none of them, not even search engine companies, have done anything to improve the search capabilities of Lexis-Nexis.

If you think about it, Lexis-Nexis is a treasure trove of information. Any case from anytime, anywhere, is in Lexis-Nexis. Legal definitions. Statues. Ordinances. Any legal document at all, can be found in Lexis-Nexis. Now isn't that a database worth creating useful search algorithms? Think of the hours (as in $$) that would be saved by legal departments and law students everywhere if Lexis-Nexis had the search smarts of Google, Yahoo or even MSN behind it, not to mention how much more 21st Century Lexis-Nexis would be.

Everyone is on the hunt to organize information, which usually involves trying to talk various groups of people into sharing information so it can be compiled and indexed in one spot. Why not start in an area that already has the information complied and indexed, and improve the indexing process? What good is a wealth of information in one place if you can't easily find anything?

Google's Personalized Search: Are We Really in Control?

The esteemed Peter Fleischer, Global Privacy Counsel, posted this little nugget on the Google blog which, obviously, sparked my interest in his opinion piece for the Financial Times. Ignoring a few grammatical errors and quite a few spacing issues (we hope that have more to do with FT than Mr. Fleischer), the article does a fairly good job of quietly dosing the fire of privacy concerns that have arisen since Google's bid to acquire DoubleClick (for another ridiculous amount of money)and its change in its data retention policy.

Mr. Fleischer states that "the responsible way to handle this privacy issue is to ask users if they want to opt in to the service." He goes on to explain that when you open a Google account, you are giving your consent to Google Personalized Search, or "opting in" to the service. And just like email marketing campaigns, you can still "opt out." The point, however, is that the user is in control, which for some sounds a little odd coming from a company like Google. Control, by its nature, is a facade. No one is really "in control," some just manipulate better than others so the illusion of control seems all the more real.

I always think of that scene from "Jurassic Park," where Hammond and Ellie are sitting at a long table, trying to eat up the melting ice cream, and Hammond talks about the next time, "when we have control," to which Ellie points out "but we never have control." Giving the pace of technology, you have to pause for a moment and ask, do we really have control over our search history?

Google certainly wants to make that facade look real. After all, you can turn off the "Search History" function. You don't even need to "pause" it, just use the "Remove all" or "Delete all" function and once it erases your search history, it automatically pauses the service so no more search data can be found. But is it really gone? Has it really been erased?

If you're spent anytime in the online world, you know things aren't ever really "erased." Things still exist, somewhere. And some day, a curious, enterprising individual for reasons unknown, may want to find that information that you believed had been erased. Deleted. You remember deleting your search history, pausing the function and sleeping easier. After all, Google puts your in control of your search history, right?

On a final note, a little bit of humor found on Digg: "Google in 20 years".

The Position Angle

Surprise! As reported by the Chicago Tribune, and other media outlets, Google is fighting Viacom's $1 billion copyright infringement law suit against YouTube.

Google, not surprisingly, is arguing "safe harbor" under the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act, claiming "Viacom’s complaint threatens the way hundreds of millions of people legitimately exchange information, news, entertainment, and political and artistic expression." In other words, Google is positioning itself as the defender of freedom of information and freedom of the Internet while casting Viacom as the destroyer of those freedoms.

You have to hand it to Google's legal team for always positioning the company on the angle of freedom of the Internet, of information, etc. And since Internet law, is, well, murky at best, Google is on the verge of writing Internet law that we will all have to live with, whether we like it or not. You could almost say we've been brainwashed by Google, and lured into a false sense of security that will be sealed by "Google Laws" so we're trapped.

Contrast Google's growing legal track record of the "freedom position angle" against Microsoft, another gigantic technology company quite familiar with the court system, in more than one country. Doesn't seem to matter what angle Microsoft tries to present, it always comes out sounding like a control freak, and further cements its reputation as the "evil empire," or the corporation everyone loves to hate.

It would be absolutely fascinating to compare the legal teams of both corporations and see what is about Google's team that everyone seems to love, and how they are consistently able to cast the other party as the evil-doer, even when there is a gray area that casts a very dark shadow over the colorful Google logo. And what is it about the Microsoft legal team that seems to perpetuate the "evil empire" persona?

Lorem Ipsum Employment Law

A friend with time and money on his hands, spends his time trolling the Internet for random stuff. He found this while trolling and it struck me as funny.

It's the website of an employment law firm, and something must've gone somewhere since their page related to has placement holder text on it. Ha! A law firm, an employment law firm, has placement text on its live website. That's funny. And how embarrassing for the law firm, and the web design company, assuming they even know about it.

Sort of makes you wonder what else is a "place holder" on that website, doesn't it? And who exactly wasn't paying attention? The law firm? Or whatever company designed the website? I'd think twice about hiring either one!

Or maybe they've noticed by now and fixed it.

Anyway, it was a good chuckle. Thanks JJ!

Google Building a Future Defense? Or Being Helpful?

How interesting to see this post from Google on Robots Exclusion Protocol. Anyone want to bet someone from legal said hey, we need to let people know about this so we have a defense against law suits from every which way about copyright infringement. So they next time media organizations sue them, they can point and say hey, did you do this?

Or maybe Google is just trying to be friendly and providing people everywhere with useful information how to prevent the illustrious Googlebot from indexing its pages.

Their motto is, after all, Don't Be Evil.

So what is the left hand doing now?

Google Spelling Issues Side Effect of Belgium Ruling?

Ha! I found this on Digg and then had to check for myself. Apparently Google has spelling issues today. The company name is missing a letter.

Maybe they are still upset about the ruling by a Belgium court that says that Google violated copyright laws. The post on the official Google Blog is a rather lackluster response. I like the "great value and provide critical information to Internet users" bit. I didn't know a news tease was critical information. Thanks, Google, for clarifying.

The other fun snippet is the "nearly universally accepted" standard of the robots.txt file. Except that the Googlebot doesn't always seem to follow info in the robotx.txt file. I always find it fascinating when they say it is the simplest way to avoid having certain pages or sections of a website indexed, only to find those exact pages or sections of a website indexed even though the robots.txt file says no. Of course, with Google's cache, it takes forever to get those pages completely removed, even when you make a request.

I'll agree that content providers need to ask for content to be removed, but I also think that going to the courts can be the quickest way to having the request fulfilled. We take telecommunications companies and others to court to get swift action, why not Internet companies like Google?

It will be interesting to see what happens to copyrighted content on the Web after this. Google has had its issues in China, and now it is running into walls in Europe. Understandable as there isn't universal copyright law, or universal enforcement of copyright law. No matter what, it is a slippery slope, and Google stumbled.

Will the company some day join the list of companies built on contradictions?

Feb. 2, 2007 UPDATE: An enterprising person by the name of "K" pointed out a spelling error: "snipet" is indeed spelled "snippet" and has since been corrected.

As for being a "Snarky chump," you can't know one until you've been one.

Thanks for the tip, K.

The Google Video and YouTube Mutual Separation Marriage

Few people were surprised when Google bought YouTube in November of last year, though the sticker price raised quite a few eyebrows, made instant billionaires out of its founders and gave rise to a YouTube backlash on par with musicians "selling out."

So it is of little surprise that Google would take to its "blog" to try and bring some clarity to the Google Video vs YouTube acquisition challenge.

The two aren't exactly going to be married in the same may many people assumed: one would over take the other. Instead, it seems as if they agree to a mutual separation marriage. YouTube will continue to operate independently from Google and Google Video, but be given access to Google technology and support. Sounds more like a child from a poor family being adopted by a rich, have-anything family.

Clearly there are changes in store for Google Video, which begs one to wonder if Google has decided to surrender to YouTube and just make Google Video a video search engine powerhouse. At least, that's what this paragraph seems to be suggesting:

Google search results already include links to content that's hosted on YouTube. Starting today, YouTube video results will appear in the Google Video search index: when you click on YouTube thumbnails, you will be taken to YouTube.com to experience the videos. Over time, Google Video will become even more comprehensive as it evolves into a service where you can search for the world's online video content, irrespective of where it may be hosted.

YouTube results show up in Google Video, and clicking on the thumbnail takes you to the video on YouTube. So if you search YouTube, does that mean Google Video clips will appear? Or will there be the same video clip on Google Video and YouTube? What do you suppose to be used to determine if the YouTube video or the Google Video should appear first?

Hmm...things to ponder....and it still remains to be seen if the legal troubles with YouTube start to diminish. YouTube is reaching out to the TV and film industries, trying to ink deals to distribute content and negate the mounting copyright lawsuits. Keeping YouTube as a separate entity, an "independent subsidiary," has its legal justifications and pitfalls, but makes sense.

We shall see....as the sage continues....

Terrorists Using Google Earth? Shocking

John Battelle has a post on his blog about a NY Post article and a more detailed one at the Telegraph about how terrorists are using Google Earth to locate British bases.

This part of the Telegraph article I find rather amusing:

A Google spokesman said the information could be used for "good and bad" and was available to the public in many forms. "Of course we are always ready to listen to governments' requests," he said.

"We have opened channels with the military in Iraq but we are not prepared to discuss what we have discussed with them. But we do listen and we are sensitive to requests."

"Always ready to listen to governments' requests." Interesting phrasing, wouldn't you say? Sure. They'll listen. Hell, anyone will listen. But would they do anything? I mean, c'mon, they listened and more than likely read subpoenas for search queries from the US government, but didn't fork anything over. They listened, quite well clearly, to the demands of the Chinese government and complied in order to launch Google in China and listened but didn't pay much attention to the backlash they received for giving into China.

Also, if a product like Google Maps can be used for "good and bad," doesn't that violate the Google policy of "Do no evil"? Or are they going to hide behind the thinking that once the produce is out there, they are not responsible for how people use it?

Seems as if technology, especially at a company like Google, will push ahead and deal with legal ramifications later and in the process set a rather dangerous precedent.

So would the lack of net neutrality limit the ability of terrorists to use Google Earth?

Net Neutrality Making a Come Back?

There is an op/ed piece in the New York Times today called "Protecting Internet Democracy" that argues for net neutrality, and rightly so. With the Democratic Congress, odds are good net neutrality will make more than a passing appearance. AT&T has already made concessions on the issue in order to will approval of its acquisition of BellSouth. No doubt there are some loop holes, which AT&T will try to exploit in the name of profit, though it will say it is necessary in order to maintain its vast network of cables.

The news of the AT&T concessions and the possibility of net neutrality law made rounds on Digg as well, which fans the flames of curiosity and determination on both sides of the issue. Seems net neutrality is starting to move to the forefront again, making a little more noise along the way.

Time will tell at this point if it will be heard long and clear by all instead of the politically and technologically savvy groups. Wonder if it will become an issue in the next presidential election...

Patent Searching a Snap....but What's Missing?

Praise the Lord! Thank you Jesus! Google and the United States Patent Office have gotten together to bring you Google Patent Search, as Google so nicely announced on its official blog. Finally, a piece of useful news!

Google has taken the USPTO patent search, a somewhat tricky, cumbersome process (though it does produce a nice list of information)and simplified it. A government process...simplified! Whodathunkit?

Granted there are only 7 million records in Google Patent Search, but hopefully it is a sign of things to come. And we'll all know if Google starts playing with the results so their information "disappears."

And it should be clarified to people that this is a search on PATENTS. Not trademarks. So if you want to see the early drawings of Edison's prototype light bulb, you'll find it. If you want to know if someone owns a trademark on the word "light bulb" or how many variations people have trademarked, you still have to go through the USPTO website and search under "Trademarks."

At any rate, something useful has been posted on the Official Google Blog, and they have actually proved a useful service.

So what's the line on how long it will take people to exploit this nifty new search opportunity?

And you know what is missing from the patent search results? Or have you not noticed?