Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Science Videos Search Engine

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the do-mentos-and-coke-count-as-science-yet dept.

Rami writes "ScienceHack is a search engine for science videos. What makes ScienceHack unique is that every video is screened by a scientist or an engineer to verify the video's accuracy and quality. ScienceHack focuses on many topics including physics, chemistry and biology. If you go to YouTube to search for videos, you will get spam videos and comments and many conspiracy and low quality videos. ScienceHack has none of that. ScienceHack currently supports videos from YouTube, Google videos and Metacafe."
http://sciencehack.com/

4 of 51 comments (clear)

  1. Good question by benhocking · · Score: 2, Interesting

    If I didn't hear chemistry explained in wrestling terms, would I have ever understood it? Would a video of some college kid explaining it be screened from ScienceHack?

    A good question, but as I understand it, such videos would be welcome - as long as they were accurate and of good quality. That's a somewhat sticky measuring stick, however, as what one scientist might call "simplifying", another might call "dumbing down" or just "wrong". I suspect they will not be overzealous about such screening, however.

    --
    Ben Hocking
    Need a professional organizer?
  2. Partial matching by benhocking · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I had to see if you were lying or not, and unfortunately, you weren't. The searching technique relies on partial matching, so "paris" is found in "comparison", and an OR match is used to "hilton" is not required. Thankfully, searching on "paris hilton" in quotes returns no hits.

    --
    Ben Hocking
    Need a professional organizer?
  3. Re:The Media by ScrewMaster · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Yeah, no kidding. Although, when you get right down to it, the media people aren't necessarily stupid or ignorant ... what they are is self-serving. They have numerous sources they could use to check their content, and I'm sure they do. But they go ahead and publish that unfounded nonsense anyway because it makes money, and it makes money because We, The People, would rather be entertained than informed. That's going to cost us.

    They say we get the government we deserve: I guess that also applies to our news organizations. Not that I perceive much difference between the two any longer, given the number of serious domestic issues we're facing right now that get little or no coverage in mainstream media. Or if they do get covered, they get it exactly wrong.

    Back on topic, ScienceHack is an interesting idea, with some promise. I mean, wow, a site with science videos reviewed by actual scientists? Well, maybe almost scientists (grad students and so forth), but still, that's pretty cool. Granted, all scientists are not of equal caliber, but nevertheless having at least the obvious crap weeded out is a good thing for anyone interested in the subject. Certainly YouTube isn't going to bother filtering out the baloney.

    --
    The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
  4. Re:Peer review? by Varun+Soundararajan · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I just tried a few queries where the result I know is in Google Videos. None of them turned up. It was related to science but the results were irrelevant.
    eg:
    1) Near Death Experience gave - Using a spatula..
    2) Time travel gave -- Introduction to CSS editing using Firebug | How many times the ball is passed between the white players? |

    This is totally retared.. My Pegions would pick better search results any time.!

    --
    the purpose of carping is always to improve its standard. -Myself