Finally Something Interesting

The first 6 chapters, were largely History, and in my opinion boring. They went through pretty much the complete History of Search, which in and of itself could be interesting, but I didn't like the way it was set up. It was kind of hard for me to get through. If this book were used in class I would suggest doing some time of time line or something to keep things straight because it was not completely chronological, and I kept having to take time out to think, when the switched "topics" or "companies" what was going on in the other places at the same time.
Chapter 7 was on the Search Economy and was rather interesting. It started tackling the questions of what Google can and cannot do with the power it yields in the consumer market.
Several Discussion Questions could be taken from this chapter alone:
- Does Google have a right to do with their Search Engine as they please, or should they be regulated by strict government laws to address the legality of their actions? Should the government be allowed to dictate Google's changes to their search algorithms?
- Keeping in mind Google's goal: to preserve organic results for their customers, how would you address the "Shades of Grey" problem?
- What is a black hat practice and how do you feel about Google shooting down results they accuse of these practices? Should Google publish lists of black hat practices, and give sites a warning before they send them to the "deadly" fifteenth page?
~Christina