Google Squared, part 1: Providing Context

This week's topic: the future of online searching.

Google describes Google Squared :

Google Squared is an experimental tool that takes a category (like US presidents, roller coasters, or digital cameras) and attempts to create a starter "square" of information, automatically fetching and organizing facts from across the web. You can modify your square by removing rows and columns you don't like--or by adding new rows and columns and having Google Squared attempt to fetch the relevant facts. Verify and correct the facts in your square by exploring the original sources and investigating other possible values. If you're happy with your square you can save it and come back to it later. Google Squared does the grunt work for you, making research fast and easy.

"Fast and easy" sums it up, doesn't it? That's what people want. And with every improvement in technology, that standard gets higher (or, should that be shorter?).

"Save the time of the reader."
-Ranganathan's Fourth Law of Library Science

Fast and easy isn't necessarily a bad thing. I'd much rather research in an online database than go through the steps of searching an index, finding the issues with the relevant articles, and finally photocopying them. All at the library, of course. It's a much more convenient method of getting to the same information.

"Same information" is the catch, though, isn't it? As librarians, we're concerned with the accuracy of the information retrieved. Online databases housing electronic journal articles provide the exact same information as the print versions.

As we all know, "information" on the world wide web varies widely in accuracy, relevance, and timeliness.

So, the question is: do changes in search format correspond to improvements in search results' quality?