Best in Show – Search
Engines
Kid
Safe Search Engines
1. Yahooligans – What a fantastic site this is! I had never heard of
Yahooligans prior to this assignment but I promise I will be back again and
again using this for a great kid friendly site. I was really surprised with the
ease at which I could navigate around the site, because from past experience I
have not liked the standard Yahoo.com pages. I love this site because it offers
kids a little bit of everything: from school to entertainment, to horoscopes,
all the way to craft ideas. I was very pleased to see the results when I tested
the search engine by typing in questionable topics only to find
academically/science related sites or no results at all. An A+ site for any
teacher!
2. Ask Jeeves Kids – This is a great site I would recommend for any student or
child that has a specific question they would like to learn more about. This
site is my second choice for Kid Safe search engine because it does not have
the multitude of different areas present on the home page that I found at
Yahooligans. I had multiple results for the question, “What are square roots?”
but no results for “How does a sewing machine work?” I would recommend this
site for a resource to be used during school projects but not in the daily web
surfing capacity.
News/Current
Event Search Engines
1. CNN – As with any news website, the minute you get to their main page and every square
inch of the screen is filled with some news story or picture or banner of one
type or another. Despite the visual chaos, I found CNN to be the easiest to
decipher which articles I wanted to read and which I could dismiss. The name,
“CNN” is a very respectable and reliable news source on television and I feel
they have done a superb job in carrying over that reputation to the internet. I
found the broad based category menu on the left-hand side most convenient in
finding the right articles.
2. Google News – Google, in general, is
an extremely surfer friendly website and Google News is no exception. I found
the search bar a great addition to the site because it allows the viewer to
skip right to the article he/she is looking for. If the viewer is not in search
of any one new item, the main page displays the top stories of the day and hour
for up-to-date information in many different areas. I felt Google News was not
as clearly organized as I found CNN to be and that is why it fell to second
place.
Shopping
Search Engines
1. Froogle – This is a wonderful shopping site that is very similar to
how the popular Google.com is set up. The main page allows you to just type in
what ever the target of your search happens to be and almost instantly spits
out hundred and thousands of possible matches. I was most attracted to the
“sort by price” option which allows the shopper to only look at the items that
are in his/her price range. I find Google.com to be the most convenient of the
“general” search engines and was very pleased to find that level of
effortlessness in a shopping search engine as well.
2. Shopzilla - Shopzilla was an unexpected surprise. It was in a context outside
this assignment that I was advised to visit the site and when I got around to
actually getting up there, I loved it! The site is very well organized, easy to
maneuver around, and very surfer friendly in its search results. I practiced
using the search engine by doing a little personal shopping and found that the
results were from a wide range of stores and websites. I was very pleased with
the site and would recommend trying it out.
Medical
Search Engines
1. WebMD – I found the WebMD site to be the most useful when researching different
aspect of the medical field. They offer a “check your symptoms” link as well as
a generic “in the news” site. The dedication they put forth focusing on health,
weight management, and cancer awareness all contributed to why this was my top
choice. I would recommend this site first to anyone interested in researching
the medical field, although it is very easy to read each synopsis of a given
condition and claim, “I think I have that!”
2. Healthfinder – The Healthfinder website was very
simplistic in its appearance, and that’s one of the things that was so attractive about it. The site did not overwhelm the
viewer with flashy clipart or extensive menu listing,
it gave you broad categories to choose from and allowed you to choose more and
more specific links as you progressed through the choices. I also liked the section
dedicated to the health observances on the main page. When I visited, it was
Eating Disorder Awareness Week and provided numerous links to find resources,
help, information, and support.
Travel
Search Engines
1. Orbitz – This was my favorite travel-related search engine out there
because I found it to be the most conveniently set up. The home page is very
well organized, clear to read and understand, and the results were displayed in
a chart that was easily deciphered. I was very pleased with the web
“atmosphere” created on the site and would highly recommend the address to any
fellow traveler. (Additionally, I had a blast planning for my pretend trip to
2. Travelocity – This was a great site that I liked wandering around because
it displayed lots of different options for your vacation on each of the pages
you visited. I was very pleased to see how they made student discounts a major
category in the pop-down menu and offered a calendar to easily click on your
flight dates. I felt this was superior to the other sites I visited but was not
as customer-friendly as Orbitz.com.