Comments on: Can Twitter really beat Google search?

By: chris backhouse

chris backhouse — Thu, 17 Jun 2010 17:11:30 +0000

Are you a TOE? Google versus Twitter … Very interesting http://2tu.us/2bgx … so, what's the weather going to be like next week ;-)

By: Simon Sellars

Simon Sellars — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 23:11:37 +0000

… this leads to other musings: Twitter vs Google. Of course, this has been argued b4: http://tinyurl.com/af96rv http://tinyurl.com/auqeaq

By: paymon

paymon — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 17:46:48 +0000

Remembered my boss talking about this. http://bit.ly/zXg5Q

By: Calvin Lee

Calvin Lee — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 07:23:37 +0000

RT @thetechnewsblog “Can Twitter REALLY beat Google search?” http://tinyurl.com/auqeaq

By: .

Tue, 10 Feb 2009 05:12:30 +0000

RT @thetechnewsblog: “Can Twitter REALLY beat Google search?” http://tinyurl.com/auqeaq

By: Brennan Wozencroft

Brennan Wozencroft — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 02:19:56 +0000

RT @thetechnewsblog: Twitter v Google – http://tinyurl.com/auqeaq. Twitter wins on trust.

By: News Quote

News Quote — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 23:19:03 +0000

I find myself asking my Twitter friends questions that, at one time, I’d just Google http://ff.im/-YS7f

By: Victor

Victor — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 22:58:59 +0000

Well I think that Twitter is more of a place for an Opinion or some sort of specialized knowledge whereas Google is good for looking up facts and information. You can’t really compare the two because some people may not have a large number of followers thus, rendering Twitter fairly useless. I think it may be better to compare Facebook vs Twitter to find information from your friends vs your followers.

Thianks,

Vic

By: jeff shuey

jeff shuey — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 21:31:46 +0000

You covered both sides of the argument here. That’s OK. I tend to agree with your second point. Twitter is a decent input/output or questions-in / answers-out model, but it’s not a search engine. At least not in the classic sense of a search engine. A search engine needs much more power than the ability to identify a few keywords and click enter. Twitter does a good job with this, but so does any reliable database.

Could Twitter become the next great search engine? I don’t see it happening. Don’t get me wrong – I’m not down on Twitter. I just don’t happen to think search is what twitter is or should be best at. Perhaps Twitter should partner with some of the best search engines out there to create a best of breed experience. I don’t work for Twitter (but I’d certainly like to chat with them) so I don’t have any insight into what they want to be in their next incarnation. However, I hope becoming a search engine isn’t one of them.

By: Charlie Flowers

Charlie Flowers — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 21:04:55 +0000

You have some great points, and I have to agree that I find myself asking my Twitter friends questions that, at one time, I’d just Google. But, there is one flaw (as I see it) to the idea that Twitter could ever knock Google off of it’s high-horse, and that’s the older (non-computer) generation. Now, don’t get me wrong, some older people are quite tech savvy, but there are others that aren’t as proficient on computers. Case in point would be my mother and father, they check their emails and do occasional Google searches, but I can’t ever see them signing up for a Twitter account…it’s not that they can’t, it’s that they won’t. They have a general mistrust of any online applications that require their personal information, and I think that many others of the older generation are the same way. I think that would be a major hurdle in Twitter’s world domination. :-)

BTW, TOE’s…love it! :D