Phil Bradley's weblog

UK housewives rule in online time

Fun article from the BBC NEWS | Technology site which has picked up on a TNS survey looking at internet use. UK housewives spend 47% of their leisure time online. I'm rather doubtful of this figure to be honest, but it's a statistic so it must be right! Other UK related results showed that the UK is the least trusting of print newspaper based information of any of the 16 countries surveyed. Students spend 39% of their time online, while the unemployed spent 32%. 58% of UK respondents had met online friends, the average being 60%.

UK Govt Minister looks like a fool...

I've resisted this one since Saturday, but can manage no longer. In the BBC news story Website age ratings 'an option' it's reported 'Culture Secretary' Andy Burnham wants to apply film-style ratings to websites in an attempt to 'save the children'. The lack of understanding this man shows regarding the internet is quite astonishing. I can only suppose his civil servants dislike him as well, given that they didn't actually stop his gibberish getting published.

It wasn't so long ago that the government was talking about having chat rooms policed to 'save the children', and a fat lot came of that. Quite how a rating system is going to stop children looking at anything is baffling to say the least. The best that it'll do is encourage children to look for X rated sites, leading to the exact opposite of what Nitwit Burnham wants.

I love some of the things he says: "content standards online are not as clear as we've all been used in traditional media". No, that's right, and that's because the internet is not traditional media - we do things differently here y'know. (I'm going to sidestep the whole WWW v Internet debate since I suspect it'll be a definition too far for him). The classic political doublespeak however comes when he says that he doesn't want to curb free speech while in the same breath saying that he wants to protect the public from 'unacceptable' material. So that'll be censorship then?

I could weep sometimes, really I could.

A lot of Brits don't understand search engines | Technology | guardian.co.uk

I think we can probably file this under 'no surprise there then!' I doubt that many other people really understand search engines either. However, as information people it's worth knowing what they particularly don't get, and acccording to the Guardian article A lot of Brits don't understand search engines 24% believe that website owners can't affect the ranking, 22% believe ranking is paid, 19% have no clue how ranking is arrived at, while 5% believe it's arranged at random.

So, next time you're showing a user around the net and pointing out search engines to them, those are the things that you might want to address in particular.

75% of Brits 'Can't Live' without the Web

According to PC World 3/4 of Brits 'Can't Live' without the Web  which seems to me to be slightly on the high side. However, it's a YouGov survey apparently, so I'm guessing it must be right.

More details: A further 27% experienced increased stress levels if they can't get on the net, leading to the condition defined as 'Discomgooglation'. 26% said the interent is absolutely vital to organizing their lives and 19% say they spend more time on the net than with their family. 20% admitted they pay the Internet more attention than their partner.

Interesting UK related internet statistics

Two-thirds of UK homes now online. This is according to a BBC news report taken from the Office for National Statistics. Almost 16.5 million households have internet access, which is an increase of 1.2 million since 2007.

Homes in the South East are most likely to have net access, while those in the North East least likely. Over 66% of adults go online every or almost every day, and men are more regular users than women.

In those households without net access there is an increase in the proportion who don't want access from 3% to a surprisingly high 24%.

Unsurprisingly however the better educated are more likely to be online. 93% of adults under 70 who have a degree are likely to have access, against 56% with no formal qualifications.

Laptop and PC use has grown fourfold since 2002.

TFPL - ebic 2008 Social Impact Awards

TFPL - ebic 2008 Social Impact Awards. The ebic Social Impact Award, to be introduced at ebic 2008 in Berlin from 1-3 October, is a recognition of the innovative use of knowledge and information management (KIM) in the charity and voluntary sectors and the contribution that people relatively new to the KIM arena have made. Five finalists (Fellows) of an innovation competition held in the run up to ebic will be offered conference places plus travel and accommodation expenses. The organisers are seeking entries from individuals from disciplines relevant to knowledge and information management (information, knowledge, records or technology management). They would particularly encourage new entrants to the knowledge and information area to apply.

UK Polish Internet usage on the rise

According to Hitwise, UK Polish Internet usage on the rise. It's estimated there are somewhere between half and one million Polish people in the country and as a result, interest in Polish sites is on the rise. Unsurprisingly the Polish version of Google is the most popular site, but there are a number of others that do well, including a site to support Polish people in Scotland, which has to be a niche area if ever there was one.

If you've got a lot of Polish people in your area you might want to consider getting some more information on the country or doing a display of links in the library that might interest them. The Hitwise article is a good start and I've got a list of 39 Poland search engines that might be worth taking a peek at. Poland is actually very well represented with search engines and does better than a lot of other European countries.

SheriffRatings - say what you feel

SheriffRatings. Ever had particularly good or bad service from a shop, restaurant, plumber etc. and wanted to make sure that other people were aware of it? This is one area that SheriffRatings comes into play. It's the 3rd largest ratings directory and currently has over 50,000 users and 250,000 hits a month.

The interface is simple, in that you simply choose the type of service that you want, or the company name and a location.

Best Rated UK Directory - SheriffRatings.com via kwout

Search results are arranged by Best rated, though this can be re-ordered by A-Z or distance. They also have a 'featured UK town' section, and have introduced new user features with the inevitable social networking and SMS. Businesses also get a free listing on the site and have been described as the 'MySpace for Businesses'. They're also offering small businesses Google Adwords packages, and are planning on adding more social networking features in 2008.

So if you're looking for something more than a straightforward listing of resources and/or want to let everyone know what you think about a service, take a peek.

[In the interests of transparency I should point out that Sheriff Ratings do advertise on my site, but equally in the interests of transparency should also point out I don't take advertising from anyone that I haven't personally checked out myself!]

Almost 50 UK search engines disappear in 3 years

I keep a page on my site: Country and Regional search engines: United Kingdom which lists UK based search engines. I went through it recently to check to see if the links were still accurate, and pointing towards the search engines that were originally at that domain. Of 164 sites almost 50 search engines had ceased to exist. (The exact number was 46 - 28% of the total.) In many cases the URL no longer worked, in a small number of others the domain had been taken over and was essentially parked, and in an even smaller number the domain was being used for entirely different enterprises.

This isn't really that much of a surprise, given that the big four control well in excess of 90% of the market.  The search engines that seem to have survived, or perhaps even prospered are the UK variants of some of the major engines, or which have a specific unique selling point, covering specific parts of the country, or dealing with niche vertical markets.  Nonetheless, it still doesn't make comforting reading for an enterprises that are considering starting their own UK engines.

The collection of links, both live and dead can be seen on my site on the United Kingdom search engine web page.

Online Information 2007

As you doubtless know, next week is Online Information 2007 which is one of the premier information conferences and exhibitions for librarians and information professionals, but you all knew that anyway. I've been involved with it in one way or another for about the last 20 years, mainly as a delegate, exhibition goer, on a stand or, for most of this century, speaking at the conference, moderating and such like.

Unfortunately, because of Jill's illness I felt that I had to pull out this year - she's just starting chemo and we'll have to see how she is affected by it. Obviously if she's not well I'm going to need to spend time with her, and rather than let everyone down at the last minute, felt that the responsible thing to do would be to pull out earlier and give everyone time to get alternatives up and running. I'm disappointed not to be there, but life is what happens when you're busy making other plans I'm afraid. And besides, I'm sure everyone will be able to cope more than adequately! Best wishes to everyone, and I hope the conference goes well.