That's research too.
Not all research is ground breaking, or earth shattering. Sometimes researchers
find things to which upon reflection we can nod our heads and say to ourselves
"that sort of makes sense". I usually follow the studies of the Pew
Internet & American Life Project with a great deal of interest. We can
learn quite a bit from the picture that these studies paint of how people relate
to, and adapt to, these various technologies. But afterwards, in a somewhat Chinese
restaurant style where after a full meal we discover that we're still hungry,
we find ourselves wondering whether we've learned anything that we didn't already
assume, or could have figured out on our own.
It certainly shouldn't be particularly surprising that running an internet search
has become pretty much a daily activity for many internet users. Unless all you
intend to do is check the weather, the sports and the other headlines on the pre-installed
MSN home page on your browser, you're probably going to have to run a search.
And since these searches bring results, it also
shouldn't surprise us, that, in the words of the
recent report on Search Engine Users:
Internet users are extremely positive about search engines and the experiences they have when searching the internet.
But, particularly because most searches are most probably for information which
isn't difficult to find, it's also not surprising that web users aren't particularly
sophisticated searchers. Why should they be if a simple search brings them quickly
to what they want. Which may be a convincing explanation for the finding that:
Only 38% of users are aware of the distinction between paid or “sponsored” results and unpaid results. And only one in six say they can always tell which results are paid or sponsored and which are not. This finding is ironic, since nearly half of all users say they would stop using search engines if they thought engines were not being clear about how they presented paid results.
As someone with quite a bit of experience at blocking paid results out of my field
of vision, I can well understand that when users become aware of the fact that
these results exist, and aren't always easily distinguishable from other results,
they might become upset. But more than anything else, rather than being "ironic",
this reaction seems to suggest a high degree of satisfaction. After all, even
if they click on paid results, they still get to something they're happy to find.
And what this basically (and not surprisingly) suggests is that using the internet,
and conducting searches have become integrated parts of people's lives - not in
some revolutionary and life-changing manner, but as one other hu-hum aspect of
those lives.
Go to: It didn't look like an advertisement, or
Go to: Equal in the eyes of cyberspace.