What a horrible misquote of my fave military hero - The Marquis of Montrose - although I agree that if you trust your data to WinME, you are probably risking losing it entirely:)
Its a shameless plug for my employer but you might want to consider the XML-based forms technology provided by PureEdge Solutions. It lets you blend interactive XML-based forms with digital signatures, and could have several applications in such a setup.
Whereas my experience from my wife owning one (and writing reviews for the games) is that the thing works fantastically, the games are pretty good overall (and Shenmue is awesome), and we have experienced no appreciable problems whatsoever.
The big problem is simply that Sega did not spend the money on marketing to get people excited about the Dreamcast. Oh, and having seen the graphics on the PS2 I dont know what the hype is about - the Dreamcast games are the equal or better of any PS2 game I have seen so far.
I think that the most important issue here is balance of play. I support Sony, Verant, et al in opposing the sale of in-game items and characters for the simple reason that it offers an unfair advantage to specific players that is not an inherent part of the game. I play EQ because I enjoy playing the game (read 'cause I am addicted') NOT because I can make a buck doing so. My character is not that high level so far (10th level shaman), but I have already seen characters appearing in my area that come decked out with equipment that is far beyond my price range - which I have to assume they have either purchased elsewhere or given from one of their players to another of their players as handmedowns - giving them a tremendous advantage over me.
I am distressed to hear from other/.ers that when I reach the 15-25 level range I might find all the good areas camped by higher level characters so they can make a buck on Ebay. I sincerely hope this is NOT the case. I am not a supporter of EULAs generally - I think that placing conditions on software or services AFTER I have purchased them ought to be declared illegal - so I am now in a real conundrum: I hope Sony and Verant win this case because I am opposed to online sale of items and characters that I feel has the potential to ruin a game I really enjoy, but I also dont want to see the concept of the EULA given any legal approval.
In the end I think the quality of the game experience is the most important thing to me - its why I play - if it gets turned into another place for pathetic, useless, and utterly dispicable individuals to try to exploit and make another buck from equally useless wretches who are unable to do something for themselves and instead feel they have to purchase any advantage they can get rather than gaining skills for themselves then I will have to vote with my feet (and great regret) and go find another game that is more reasonably contructed (or give up a hobby because the bastards have won out over the true players).
And its been around for a while as a concept. I used to work for SpaceRef who maintain an excellent niche search engine devoted to space exploration.
I maintain Omphalos which is a niche search engine devoted to the modern alternative religions (Paganism, Wicca, etc) and related subjects.
All it really requires is a reliable collection of websites focusing on a specific range of subjects and good search engine software to index their pages. The results are often much more relevant than those from the major search engines - although Google is generally an excellent choice IMHO.
I expect that this is exactly what will happen. The moment he gets into ecomomic or other difficulties that weaken his chances of reelection, the US will find a reason to go to war against some small, relatively weak nation (so there is no chance of loosing - bad PR) and that will draw the public's attention away. It worked for his dad in the Gulf and it worked for Clinton in the Balkans, and it will work for the latest American Emperor "Dubya". Its beginning to look like US Big Business has bought just the politician it wanted.
Without a doubt there have been two teachers in my education that stand head and shoulders above the rest.
Mr Skinner (Richmond BC), my grade 7 teacher can be credited with introducing me to Science Fiction/Fantasy and the wealth of ideas associated with that genre. He instilled in me an interest in literature of all sorts, in writing my own thoughts, and in research.
In High School (Saltspring Island, BC, Canada), I was fortunate enough to be taught History and Geography by Ted Harrison. This wonderful man loved teaching, loved his students, and was innovative in his approach to teaching subjects (like using games to illustrate concepts - no study of the events leading up to WWI was complete without several games of Diplomacy for example). Without a doubt he was the best teacher I have ever encountered.
Alas, due to unfortunate events I understand he is no longer teaching. This is a great loss to countless generations of students. Wherever you are Ted, Bravo! and Thank You!
Who are you kidding? If the networks could get away with broadcasting a live Gladatorial combat to the death or a Lion eating some poor criminal they would do it like a shot - and they would find a ready audience too. Right now there is tremedous interest in so-called "real life events" and shows such as Cops have a strong audience.
I don't think our tastes are any more refined than that of the ancient Romans - its just that we are more restrained in what we permit the entertainment industry to broadcast.
I ran RoboBoard and Robo/FX at one point in my BBSes career (The Cauldron, out of Eastern Ontario, and eventually Saltspring Island BC) and loved it. The company that produced it is still around - producing excellent website and network monitoring tools. I use their Livestats on one of my websites.
Roboboard was truly cutting edge for its time, offering full GUI and graphical interfaces at a time when most BBSes were stuck in ANSI - although it gave that option too. It was also a wonderful package to configure. Nicely designed overall.
It would be good if it can also automatically find a time and day that each individual invited to the meeting is free to meet. So all you have to do is select the people and let the software do the scheduling negotiations to arrange the meeting time. I believe Exchange can do this, but since our Exchange server is just being set up (precisely because we need these calendaring features in fact) I don't know yet for sure.
As part of a study on offensive words for a Linguistics class I circulated a questionaire in the Residences at the University of Victoria. It listed about 20 "offensive" words and asked the user to rate them on a 1 (least offensive) to 7 (most offensive) scale. The results were quite interesting, as was the reception, but I have lost the paper alas.
Does Anyone remember when the internet was not commercially focused, when it was about making actual information available? It may just be me, but it struck me that the whole focus of ICANN seems to be not so much how to regulate the domainspace, but how to generate more cash out of it. I would be *so* happy to see the development of an entirely non-commercial internet where I could go to seek bona-fide information free of advertisements, commercial interests, etc.
I have developed and maintained my own website (Omphalos - The Directory & Search Engine for Paganism & Witchcraft) and expanded it to provide a wide variety of information on its subjects, and it has a growing audience (~40,000 page views per month). I have done so without any thought of making a profit from the site. My only purpose is to try to provide some useful information to others out there who might be interested in the topics covered by my website. There are many other websites out there which have the same purpose and their developers have put the same sort of time into their sites as I have into mine I am sure. We are all being lost in a sea of increasing commercialization on the web. I regularly see the assumption made that if you are on the web, and own your own domain you are naturally doing so for the purpose of making money and therefore can naturally afford the costs associated with any new requirements that spring up. When renewal time for Omphalos.net rolls around I can certainly afford the $75 required, but not if they were allowed to raise the rate to $2000. Can anyone see NSI claiming that since.biz domains go for $2000 they ought to be able to raise the rate on.com domains? I can. Therefore, I fear that it might not be all that long before the relentless drive to turn a quick buck might drive me out of my own domain space entirely.
And yes, I should probably register Omphalos.info as soon as I can, but what will it cost me?
I don't think that digital signatures will prove to be much more of a problem than standard signatures. If anything the difficulty in copying a digital signature should make them more secure generally than paper signatures. Besides almost no one checks paper signatures these days (the banks I am told will only physically check a signature on a checque if its for over $50,000 under most circumstances), digital signatures are checked as a matter of course during processing. As well trusted third parties such as Verisign can add to the perceived validity of a digital signature. The only problems involved are if an individual gives out their pass phrase for their digital signature (which is not much different that making a scan of your signature to be included on documents freely available to others in the office - a practice I have seen used elsewhere).
It will still boil down to stating in court that either you did or you did not sign a given document if the matter comes up in a legal challenge.
(Disclaimer: I work for PureEdge Solutions - a company that offers secure electronic forms technology that employs digital signatures and uses XML Forms - so I am biased in my opinions. In fact, we are helping to define the standard).
NOTE: My opinions are mine alone and not those of my employer.
Meanwhile you have just generated additional revenue for them, as a horde of interested Slashdotters (like me) type in this URL to see what shows up.
Personally, while its kinda sleazy and I sure as hell would not be likely to engage in typosquatting, I do think its inventive. This attitude will survive until such time as someone start typosquatting one of my websites of course:)
A classified advertising system might work nicely like this, where you post your interests, and while your system is idle it sifts through all of the items listed by other users to seek your objective.
The article does mention that they also use Linux and MacOS systems in space as well. Hopefully we will see a follow up article on the use of Linux as well.
Maybe the example was bad, but my point was simply that a simple text search cannot show the intention of the user. I am quite aware that you can use boolean searches, or specify addtional terms to get better relevancy. I work on three websites at the moment and all of them run search services.
Specifying additonal terms does indeed narrow down the results, but I am sure if you think about it you can come up with two or three text strings that might occur together but in different contexts.
The biggest problems with Search Engines, is relevancy. The problem being that when I do a search for a word like "magic" the search engine will return results based upon its algorithm, but trying to produce relevancy from a single search word is just about impossible as a task. With a term like "magic" I could be looking for:
Magic as in Magic the Gathering - a collectible card game I used to play.
Magic as in the occult.
Magic as in sleight-of-hand.
Or any of a large number of subjects that I could have in mind at the time of my search. The results from a search engine such as Google, will rank pages which contain the word magic in the page title, multiple times in the body of the page, in the META tags, in or near HREF links, or which are linked to by many other sites higher than those which do not meat these criteria. It differs from search engine to search engine, depending on criteria.
None of these criteria for ranking take into account the nature of my query - what I had in mind when I did the search. In other words they do not directly address the relevancy of the results. If a search engine offered me the opportunity to pick from results it returned and gradually refine the search to produce better results it would be addressing this situation. Some do with a "search again in this result set" or "more like this" type option on their results pages, but its still kinda mechanical, and not all that reliable.
I think it will take some sort of AI analysis of search requests based on user-feedback of some sort and with a learning capability to surpass the current crop of search engines. Until such time as we have some smart systems working behind the scenes on searching any improvements will no doubt be incremental rather than radical.
Now, as for keeping the specifics of how a page is ranked secret I think its absolutely necessary. There is a constant, quiet, war going on between the search engines and the folks who want to get their websites listed at the top of the page when a result set is produced. The people who regularly submit their sites to the various search engines, with each search engine receiving a specially made page generated just for its benefit to ensure that the website gets the best ranking possible etc, are not interested in how accurate the search engine is, they simply want to come up first. The folks at the search engine generally want the most relevant pages to be returned. There is an essential difference of purpose between the two camps.
On the side of the search engines, they have control over their ranking system, and change it peridically to prevent abuse of the system. The folks who are seriously trying to get to the top of the heap in the search engine results are constantly trying new methods to get ahead.
For instance, at one point some webmasters were creating their webpages with a lot of text at the bottom of the page that was the same font color as the background, so that the search engines would spider the contents of the page but users would never see those contents. This let them list all sorts of words that scored higher in the search engines returns, but had little or no relevancy to the page contents. The search engines got wise to this trick and now most will penalize you for using it.
Opening up the search engines ranking rules would only make the system easier to abuse more precisely. No matter how many eyeballs pour over the code, it will still not change the nature of the guy who will use any method at his disposal to get his porn page returned as Link #1 when you do a search for MP3 because its the hottest term currently being searched for.
Google has altered this battle somewhat by ranking pages higher in their results based on how many other webpages contain links to that page (and also based upon the nature of the linking page. They use a distinction between pages which contain a lot of links - like a web directory such as my own Omphalos - and those which are linked to by a lot of other pages. Both get points for different reasons and in different instances. I don't remember the details), but even this is open to abuse, although with a bit more effort required. I know of a website which has over 200 different URLs registered and operational, all of which contain pages which point back to the main URL they are promoting. When a search engine such as Google goes to anaylize this website, it will rank it higher because it is linked to by so many separate domains and so many separate pages on those domains. Its harder to abuse, but it can be done.
Of course, this is all basically irrelevant, since each of the search engine companies keeps their methodology and their source code highly protected. It is worth millions of dollars in revenue, and I cannot honestly see any of them deciding to release their software in this way.
If you have not noticed, practically every graduate student who devises a new and effective method of indexing and ranking search results ends up creating their own company once they have delivered their thesis and entered the real world. That is certainly how Google started, and I believe is also how Ask Jeeves got going. I am sure that most of the other main search engines have gotten going in the same or similiar manners.
All that said, If you want to play with a true search engine that is GPLed and works quite well, although not on the scale of a Google or an Altavista, try UDMSearch. It runs just fine under Linux or FreeBSD (I have installed it on both in the past) and I am using it on my site under Solaris. It is still in an intense development cycle and new versions are released regularly, but its worth exploring if you are interested in how a search engine works, and want to get your hands dirty.
For more information on the big boys, check out Search Engine Watch, and finally, if you are simply interested in Space, Space Exploration or Space Science, check out SpaceRef.
First of all Google does not rank SOLELY based on links to a page, they use a combination of the number of links to the page, the text on the page, its position, etc just like every other search engine. They also use the number of links from the page, and the text for 50 or so characters on either side of a link that links to the page. Its a wonderfully complex set of formulas that are being used to determine relevancy. While I have read the early papers on the methodology that Google is employing (from when it was a Academic project) it has obviously undergone a lot of improvements and refinements over time. They do not release the ranking criteria they are using to the general public (this is normal for Search Engine companies, who guard their criteria closely, and periodically change them without notice).
What seems most likely to me, is simply that Since Google has partnered with Yahoo, they have shared details on their ranking system or have assisted Yahoo staff in positioning the ranking of Yahoo pages in the Google database. As a result, the ranking position of Yahoo pages is on the rise simply because they have some inside information or help. That is why the pages have risen slowly over time, rather than simply popping to the top of the charts, as they might if Google had simply rewritten their formulas to make an exception when a Yahoo page is concerned.
With the work that has gone into creating Google, I do not think they would want to do any screwing around with their formulas that would result in major changes like people are suggesting here. They can help their partners rank better though.
Well its certainly true within my experience that a lot of modern Pagans are also technically inclined, but not my experience that a lot of techs are Pagans. I think the one is a subset of the other.
I have been interested in computers since I first played with the mainframe at the University of Victoria, and with my friends Trash80 and Apple II. I have been interested in Witchcraft and Paganism for an even longer period - over 25 years now. I am an initiated Alexandrian Wiccan (for those not familiar with Wicca, view it as a subset of Modern Paganism. Modern Paganism includes a variety of religious beliefs based on resurrecting Pre-Christian religous practices. Neither have anything to do with Satanism, Satan being part of the Judeo-Christian mythos).
I run a website devoted to Paganism (Omphalos if you are curious), currently work as a programmer on several websites, and spend much of my time learning about various technical subjects - mostly relating to programming, Linux, and FreeBSD. Within the Pagan community, I am fairly typical.
I think the thing that attracts many technical types to Paganism is that it is generally unstructured, non-authoritarian, and fairly do-it-yourself in nature. It also does not insist in any "One True Way(TM)". I can have a conversation with another Pagan, differing in our viewpoints entirely, and there is nothing in either philosophy which excludes acceptance of the other's religous practices in most cases. Paganism accepts that there is no one truth, so there is no one correct way.
I am sorry to hear that my misfortune and frustration has entertained you in this way. I gather you do not count compassion or sympathy amongst your ethical preferences here.
I never said I believe in Moral Absolutes per se, simply that I do believe in the concept of copyright for one's works. My rights as such have been violated in my opinion. It's too bad your view of my religious choice has caused you to ignore speaking on this issue, and instead focus on maligning my religion. In my posting I made no comments of a religious nature at all, and in fact hoped to avoid any such discussions, but your inane and biased comments force me to make some reply.
In what way, are my religious beliefs (about which you know SQUAT by the way since I did not post them) "fundamentally in opposition to the entire idea of objective truth"? What objective truth, and in what way are they opposed to it?
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What a horrible misquote of my fave military hero - The Marquis of Montrose - although I agree that if you trust your data to WinME, you are probably risking losing it entirely :)
Its a shameless plug for my employer but you might want to consider the XML-based forms technology provided by PureEdge Solutions. It lets you blend interactive XML-based forms with digital signatures, and could have several applications in such a setup.
Whereas my experience from my wife owning one (and writing reviews for the games) is that the thing works fantastically, the games are pretty good overall (and Shenmue is awesome), and we have experienced no appreciable problems whatsoever.
The big problem is simply that Sega did not spend the money on marketing to get people excited about the Dreamcast. Oh, and having seen the graphics on the PS2 I dont know what the hype is about - the Dreamcast games are the equal or better of any PS2 game I have seen so far.
You couldn't give me a PS2.
I think that the most important issue here is balance of play. I support Sony, Verant, et al in opposing the sale of in-game items and characters for the simple reason that it offers an unfair advantage to specific players that is not an inherent part of the game. I play EQ because I enjoy playing the game (read 'cause I am addicted') NOT because I can make a buck doing so. My character is not that high level so far (10th level shaman), but I have already seen characters appearing in my area that come decked out with equipment that is far beyond my price range - which I have to assume they have either purchased elsewhere or given from one of their players to another of their players as handmedowns - giving them a tremendous advantage over me.
I am distressed to hear from other /.ers that when I reach the 15-25 level range I might find all the good areas camped by higher level characters so they can make a buck on Ebay. I sincerely hope this is NOT the case. I am not a supporter of EULAs generally - I think that placing conditions on software or services AFTER I have purchased them ought to be declared illegal - so I am now in a real conundrum: I hope Sony and Verant win this case because I am opposed to online sale of items and characters that I feel has the potential to ruin a game I really enjoy, but I also dont want to see the concept of the EULA given any legal approval.
In the end I think the quality of the game experience is the most important thing to me - its why I play - if it gets turned into another place for pathetic, useless, and utterly dispicable individuals to try to exploit and make another buck from equally useless wretches who are unable to do something for themselves and instead feel they have to purchase any advantage they can get rather than gaining skills for themselves then I will have to vote with my feet (and great regret) and go find another game that is more reasonably contructed (or give up a hobby because the bastards have won out over the true players).
And its been around for a while as a concept. I used to work for SpaceRef who maintain an excellent niche search engine devoted to space exploration.
I maintain Omphalos which is a niche search engine devoted to the modern alternative religions (Paganism, Wicca, etc) and related subjects.
All it really requires is a reliable collection of websites focusing on a specific range of subjects and good search engine software to index their pages. The results are often much more relevant than those from the major search engines - although Google is generally an excellent choice IMHO.
I expect that this is exactly what will happen. The moment he gets into ecomomic or other difficulties that weaken his chances of reelection, the US will find a reason to go to war against some small, relatively weak nation (so there is no chance of loosing - bad PR) and that will draw the public's attention away. It worked for his dad in the Gulf and it worked for Clinton in the Balkans, and it will work for the latest American Emperor "Dubya". Its beginning to look like US Big Business has bought just the politician it wanted.
Without a doubt there have been two teachers in my education that stand head and shoulders above the rest.
Mr Skinner (Richmond BC), my grade 7 teacher can be credited with introducing me to Science Fiction/Fantasy and the wealth of ideas associated with that genre. He instilled in me an interest in literature of all sorts, in writing my own thoughts, and in research.
In High School (Saltspring Island, BC, Canada), I was fortunate enough to be taught History and Geography by Ted Harrison. This wonderful man loved teaching, loved his students, and was innovative in his approach to teaching subjects (like using games to illustrate concepts - no study of the events leading up to WWI was complete without several games of Diplomacy for example). Without a doubt he was the best teacher I have ever encountered.
Alas, due to unfortunate events I understand he is no longer teaching. This is a great loss to countless generations of students. Wherever you are Ted, Bravo! and Thank You!
Who are you kidding? If the networks could get away with broadcasting a live Gladatorial combat to the death or a Lion eating some poor criminal they would do it like a shot - and they would find a ready audience too. Right now there is tremedous interest in so-called "real life events" and shows such as Cops have a strong audience.
I don't think our tastes are any more refined than that of the ancient Romans - its just that we are more restrained in what we permit the entertainment industry to broadcast.
My current gaming addiction is Counter-Strike - undoubtedly the most popular and IMHO the best online FPS in existence.
For sheer time wasting I would probably nominate Warcraft in its various incarnations, and before that Doom.
I ran RoboBoard and Robo/FX at one point in my BBSes career (The Cauldron, out of Eastern Ontario, and eventually Saltspring Island BC) and loved it. The company that produced it is still around - producing excellent website and network monitoring tools. I use their Livestats on one of my websites.
Roboboard was truly cutting edge for its time, offering full GUI and graphical interfaces at a time when most BBSes were stuck in ANSI - although it gave that option too. It was also a wonderful package to configure. Nicely designed overall.
It would be good if it can also automatically find a time and day that each individual invited to the meeting is free to meet. So all you have to do is select the people and let the software do the scheduling negotiations to arrange the meeting time. I believe Exchange can do this, but since our Exchange server is just being set up (precisely because we need these calendaring features in fact) I don't know yet for sure.
As part of a study on offensive words for a Linguistics class I circulated a questionaire in the Residences at the University of Victoria. It listed about 20 "offensive" words and asked the user to rate them on a 1 (least offensive) to 7 (most offensive) scale. The results were quite interesting, as was the reception, but I have lost the paper alas.
Does Anyone remember when the internet was not commercially focused, when it was about making actual information available? It may just be me, but it struck me that the whole focus of ICANN seems to be not so much how to regulate the domainspace, but how to generate more cash out of it. I would be *so* happy to see the development of an entirely non-commercial internet where I could go to seek bona-fide information free of advertisements, commercial interests, etc.
I have developed and maintained my own website (Omphalos - The Directory & Search Engine for Paganism & Witchcraft) and expanded it to provide a wide variety of information on its subjects, and it has a growing audience (~40,000 page views per month). I have done so without any thought of making a profit from the site. My only purpose is to try to provide some useful information to others out there who might be interested in the topics covered by my website. There are many other websites out there which have the same purpose and their developers have put the same sort of time into their sites as I have into mine I am sure. We are all being lost in a sea of increasing commercialization on the web. I regularly see the assumption made that if you are on the web, and own your own domain you are naturally doing so for the purpose of making money and therefore can naturally afford the costs associated with any new requirements that spring up. When renewal time for Omphalos.net rolls around I can certainly afford the $75 required, but not if they were allowed to raise the rate to $2000. Can anyone see NSI claiming that since .biz domains go for $2000 they ought to be able to raise the rate on .com domains? I can. Therefore, I fear that it might not be all that long before the relentless drive to turn a quick buck might drive me out of my own domain space entirely.
And yes, I should probably register Omphalos.info as soon as I can, but what will it cost me?
I don't think that digital signatures will prove to be much more of a problem than standard signatures. If anything the difficulty in copying a digital signature should make them more secure generally than paper signatures. Besides almost no one checks paper signatures these days (the banks I am told will only physically check a signature on a checque if its for over $50,000 under most circumstances), digital signatures are checked as a matter of course during processing. As well trusted third parties such as Verisign can add to the perceived validity of a digital signature. The only problems involved are if an individual gives out their pass phrase for their digital signature (which is not much different that making a scan of your signature to be included on documents freely available to others in the office - a practice I have seen used elsewhere).
It will still boil down to stating in court that either you did or you did not sign a given document if the matter comes up in a legal challenge.
(Disclaimer: I work for PureEdge Solutions - a company that offers secure electronic forms technology that employs digital signatures and uses XML Forms - so I am biased in my opinions. In fact, we are helping to define the standard).
NOTE: My opinions are mine alone and not those of my employer.
Something tells me we have seen this subject before.
Bluvenom.com offers a great security tool that is relatively cheap (and very painful to the ears). Worth checking out.
PureEdge offers a secure digital signature methodology that should a solution to many of the questions raised here.
Meanwhile you have just generated additional revenue for them, as a horde of interested Slashdotters (like me) type in this URL to see what shows up.
Personally, while its kinda sleazy and I sure as hell would not be likely to engage in typosquatting, I do think its inventive. This attitude will survive until such time as someone start typosquatting one of my websites of course :)
A classified advertising system might work nicely like this, where you post your interests, and while your system is idle it sifts through all of the items listed by other users to seek your objective.
The article does mention that they also use Linux and MacOS systems in space as well. Hopefully we will see a follow up article on the use of Linux as well.
Maybe the example was bad, but my point was simply that a simple text search cannot show the intention of the user. I am quite aware that you can use boolean searches, or specify addtional terms to get better relevancy. I work on three websites at the moment and all of them run search services.
Specifying additonal terms does indeed narrow down the results, but I am sure if you think about it you can come up with two or three text strings that might occur together but in different contexts.
The biggest problems with Search Engines, is relevancy. The problem being that when I do a search for a word like "magic" the search engine will return results based upon its algorithm, but trying to produce relevancy from a single search word is just about impossible as a task. With a term like "magic" I could be looking for:
Or any of a large number of subjects that I could have in mind at the time of my search. The results from a search engine such as Google, will rank pages which contain the word magic in the page title, multiple times in the body of the page, in the META tags, in or near HREF links, or which are linked to by many other sites higher than those which do not meat these criteria. It differs from search engine to search engine, depending on criteria.
None of these criteria for ranking take into account the nature of my query - what I had in mind when I did the search. In other words they do not directly address the relevancy of the results. If a search engine offered me the opportunity to pick from results it returned and gradually refine the search to produce better results it would be addressing this situation. Some do with a "search again in this result set" or "more like this" type option on their results pages, but its still kinda mechanical, and not all that reliable.
I think it will take some sort of AI analysis of search requests based on user-feedback of some sort and with a learning capability to surpass the current crop of search engines. Until such time as we have some smart systems working behind the scenes on searching any improvements will no doubt be incremental rather than radical.
Now, as for keeping the specifics of how a page is ranked secret I think its absolutely necessary. There is a constant, quiet, war going on between the search engines and the folks who want to get their websites listed at the top of the page when a result set is produced. The people who regularly submit their sites to the various search engines, with each search engine receiving a specially made page generated just for its benefit to ensure that the website gets the best ranking possible etc, are not interested in how accurate the search engine is, they simply want to come up first. The folks at the search engine generally want the most relevant pages to be returned. There is an essential difference of purpose between the two camps.
On the side of the search engines, they have control over their ranking system, and change it peridically to prevent abuse of the system. The folks who are seriously trying to get to the top of the heap in the search engine results are constantly trying new methods to get ahead.
For instance, at one point some webmasters were creating their webpages with a lot of text at the bottom of the page that was the same font color as the background, so that the search engines would spider the contents of the page but users would never see those contents. This let them list all sorts of words that scored higher in the search engines returns, but had little or no relevancy to the page contents. The search engines got wise to this trick and now most will penalize you for using it.
Opening up the search engines ranking rules would only make the system easier to abuse more precisely. No matter how many eyeballs pour over the code, it will still not change the nature of the guy who will use any method at his disposal to get his porn page returned as Link #1 when you do a search for MP3 because its the hottest term currently being searched for.
Google has altered this battle somewhat by ranking pages higher in their results based on how many other webpages contain links to that page (and also based upon the nature of the linking page. They use a distinction between pages which contain a lot of links - like a web directory such as my own Omphalos - and those which are linked to by a lot of other pages. Both get points for different reasons and in different instances. I don't remember the details), but even this is open to abuse, although with a bit more effort required. I know of a website which has over 200 different URLs registered and operational, all of which contain pages which point back to the main URL they are promoting. When a search engine such as Google goes to anaylize this website, it will rank it higher because it is linked to by so many separate domains and so many separate pages on those domains. Its harder to abuse, but it can be done.
Of course, this is all basically irrelevant, since each of the search engine companies keeps their methodology and their source code highly protected. It is worth millions of dollars in revenue, and I cannot honestly see any of them deciding to release their software in this way.
If you have not noticed, practically every graduate student who devises a new and effective method of indexing and ranking search results ends up creating their own company once they have delivered their thesis and entered the real world. That is certainly how Google started, and I believe is also how Ask Jeeves got going. I am sure that most of the other main search engines have gotten going in the same or similiar manners.
All that said, If you want to play with a true search engine that is GPLed and works quite well, although not on the scale of a Google or an Altavista, try UDMSearch. It runs just fine under Linux or FreeBSD (I have installed it on both in the past) and I am using it on my site under Solaris. It is still in an intense development cycle and new versions are released regularly, but its worth exploring if you are interested in how a search engine works, and want to get your hands dirty.
For more information on the big boys, check out Search Engine Watch, and finally, if you are simply interested in Space, Space Exploration or Space Science, check out SpaceRef.
First of all Google does not rank SOLELY based on links to a page, they use a combination of the number of links to the page, the text on the page, its position, etc just like every other search engine. They also use the number of links from the page, and the text for 50 or so characters on either side of a link that links to the page. Its a wonderfully complex set of formulas that are being used to determine relevancy. While I have read the early papers on the methodology that Google is employing (from when it was a Academic project) it has obviously undergone a lot of improvements and refinements over time. They do not release the ranking criteria they are using to the general public (this is normal for Search Engine companies, who guard their criteria closely, and periodically change them without notice).
What seems most likely to me, is simply that Since Google has partnered with Yahoo, they have shared details on their ranking system or have assisted Yahoo staff in positioning the ranking of Yahoo pages in the Google database. As a result, the ranking position of Yahoo pages is on the rise simply because they have some inside information or help. That is why the pages have risen slowly over time, rather than simply popping to the top of the charts, as they might if Google had simply rewritten their formulas to make an exception when a Yahoo page is concerned.
With the work that has gone into creating Google, I do not think they would want to do any screwing around with their formulas that would result in major changes like people are suggesting here. They can help their partners rank better though.
Well its certainly true within my experience that a lot of modern Pagans are also technically inclined, but not my experience that a lot of techs are Pagans. I think the one is a subset of the other.
I have been interested in computers since I first played with the mainframe at the University of Victoria, and with my friends Trash80 and Apple II. I have been interested in Witchcraft and Paganism for an even longer period - over 25 years now. I am an initiated Alexandrian Wiccan (for those not familiar with Wicca, view it as a subset of Modern Paganism. Modern Paganism includes a variety of religious beliefs based on resurrecting Pre-Christian religous practices. Neither have anything to do with Satanism, Satan being part of the Judeo-Christian mythos).
I run a website devoted to Paganism (Omphalos if you are curious), currently work as a programmer on several websites, and spend much of my time learning about various technical subjects - mostly relating to programming, Linux, and FreeBSD. Within the Pagan community, I am fairly typical.
I think the thing that attracts many technical types to Paganism is that it is generally unstructured, non-authoritarian, and fairly do-it-yourself in nature. It also does not insist in any "One True Way(TM)". I can have a conversation with another Pagan, differing in our viewpoints entirely, and there is nothing in either philosophy which excludes acceptance of the other's religous practices in most cases. Paganism accepts that there is no one truth, so there is no one correct way.
I am sorry to hear that my misfortune and frustration has entertained you in this way. I gather you do not count compassion or sympathy amongst your ethical preferences here.
I never said I believe in Moral Absolutes per se, simply that I do believe in the concept of copyright for one's works. My rights as such have been violated in my opinion. It's too bad your view of my religious choice has caused you to ignore speaking on this issue, and instead focus on maligning my religion. In my posting I made no comments of a religious nature at all, and in fact hoped to avoid any such discussions, but your inane and biased comments force me to make some reply.
In what way, are my religious beliefs (about which you know SQUAT by the way since I did not post them) "fundamentally in opposition to the entire idea of objective truth"? What objective truth, and in what way are they opposed to it?