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I Google everything

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Re: I Google everything

#51

Post by corin_ »

freehunter wrote: post #48
corin_ wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Talking shit" can mean exactly the same thing as "talking bullshit", in the UK at least.

In the US, talking shit means saying something negative about someone. John said I stole money from him? He's just talking shit. This could include truths; perhaps I did take his money, but there's more to the story than John mentioned. John paid me money for a service I performed but he thought it wasn't worth what he paid. John said I'm a cheat when I beat him in poker, but that was just the way the cards fell. He'…

Here you can "talk shit about" which has the meaning you use (e.g. "I was just talking shit about my colleagues"), whereas just "he's talking shit" is similar to bullshit, except maybe a little less angry and more dismissive.

Re: I Google everything

#52

Post by alexfoo »

dagw wrote: post #35
vecinu wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interestingly this happens with a certain group of friends as well. They are high-school educated people that have no intention of attending a post-secondary institution. As a corollary, another group of friends that have attended a post-secondary institution are usually the first to join in my quest for facts on Google or Wikipedia.

For what it's worth me and all my friends have post-secondary education and we all consider looking stuff up on the phone at the pub bad form and only to be done if after we've either come up with a valid guess or are completely stumped after having given it our best shot.

That's part of the point. Almost everyone can drive google to get the answer to a question (doing so efficiently is a useful skill though). I think that some of the IGG (Instant Gratification Generation) believe that being able to provide an answer (or being the first to) somehow makes them special, despite them not actually doing anything really clever to get that answer. What bugs me (taking the XKCD spark plug example) are people pretending they know something without revealing the actual source, because they don't attribute their source.

It's also great fun to see how people react to technology questions in interviews when they don't have access to the Internet. It doesn't take long to find where the edge of someone's comfort zone is and start probing there. I consider bullshit or waffle as the worst possible answer, followed closely by confidently giving a wrong answer. At the other end of the spectrum are answers of the form "Not absolutely sure but I think it is..." and/or "If I had to look it up I'd look in ////etc." Being able to quote possible sources is good as it is a useful indicator of breadth/depth of knowledge.

Back to the look-it-up or not debate; from my anecdata I'd guess at there being a better correlation with age rather than education level. IME, the younger people I work/socialise with are, the more likely they are to look things up. I seem to be on the cusp of the "look-it-up" camp which may be related to the fact that Google wasn't ubiquitous during my education (a Comp Sci degree finished in 1999), nor was the technology/access to look things up whenever I wanted (I had to go into a University building for Internet access - I only got fixed line dialup access in my final year and even then it was expensive and slow).

Re: I Google everything

#53

Post by dean »

tyler_ball wrote: post #46

I have friends that don't even type URLs anymore, they just type 'youtube' into google every time and click the first result.

Yes. I have seen this a lot with friends and co-workers. They always google the site instead of typing in the URL or even creating a bookmark. Even for sites they go to 20 times a day.

Interesting consequence, one person, who had just created a new web page using a GUI website building tool a moment before, tried to get to the site by googling it and was surprised that it did not show up in the search results. I explained that the site was just created and Google hadn't indexed it yet. The person just gave me a blank stare.

Re: I Google everything

#54

Post by dpcan »

danso wrote: post #4

> I’ve heard whispers of a time when people could talk shit at pubs and not be audited by wikipedia on the spot. Talk "shit" or "bullshit"? The latter we could stand to reduce. The former...well, I guess it is annoying that any dolt can Google up a list of 500 comebacks. So I guess the emphasized skill is in delivery rather than wit. > Where cognitive energy would need to be spent to work out your bug, instead of cop…

I think it's OK. Someone can still talk shit at a pub and say something worth auditing on Wikipedia.

Re: I Google everything

#55

Post by K2h »

I know taking issue with Einstien is not a good idea - but I'll do it anyway. Learning - and putting as much relevent material in your working memory is beneficial to seeing the bigger picture and quick informed decisions. A collection of one line facts (what you get when you look something up) does not make wisdom. Sure, most of us have extremely small working memories, but it does not negate the benefit for learning and retaining material on a subject.

as an example, I find when I have to look up the syntax for each.. and... every.. function... my programming proceeds at a snails pace. Just an example.

Re: I Google everything

#56

Post by MattLaroche »

alanfalcon wrote: post #20
sp332 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's ambiguous, but the article probably meant shit-talking.

Or even just shit like urban legends. Like when my sister-in-law says, "you know Chipoltle is owned by McDonald's, right?" and in the time frame it takes for me to think I doubt that I've already looked up the truth on my phone.

McDonalds owning Chipotle isn't an urban legend, it was true but is no longer. In 1999, Chipotle was a subsidiary of McDonalds (http://www.chipotlefan.com/index.php?id=chipotlemcdonalds), but McDonalds was fully divested around 2006 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chipotle_Mexican_Grill).

Re: I Google everything

#57

Post by PakG1 »

tyler_ball wrote: post #46

I have friends that don't even type URLs anymore, they just type 'youtube' into google every time and click the first result.

That is crazy. I thought that was behaviour reserved for people my dad's age. My dad does that all the time. I tried to teach him what a URL is, I don't think he got it.

Re: I Google everything

#58

Post by minikites »

dagw wrote: post #33
edanm wrote: post #27

Great article. A side point, but one that is more interesting to me: in my social circle, I'm the only person who actually Googles everything. When I sit down to have a conversation with most people, and questions about facts come up, I instinctively start Googling. Almost no one else does this. People will prefer to spend an entire conversation trying to guess the population of e.g. Greece, rather than spend 5 secon…

And they don't seem much interested in the answer when I provide it, actually. I'm the sort of person who would happily spend an entire conversation trying to guess the population of Greece and frown upon anybody who tried to Google it. I like the fun, social 'game' of trying to work out random stuff from a few first principles . Having someone Google for it and tell me is like someone telling me the ending of a movi…

Watch out for the Anchoring Effect:

http://youarenotsosmart.com/2010/07/27/anchoring-effect/

Is the population of Venezuela greater or fewer than 65 million?

Go ahead and guess.

Ok, another question, how many people do you think live Venezuela?

Re: I Google everything

#59

Post by njharman »

That (externalizing our memory) has been ongoing for long time. Going back in time; Computerized searching, Indexes, Libraries, Books, Written language, probably something like counting stones in pre-history.

I think it's utterly awesome. Combined with viable wearable computing I know everything ever put online. Just might take me a few moments to remember it (search time/connection speed).

It is the #1 reason copyright limitation, net neutrality, information freedom must be fought for.

Re: I Google everything

#60

Post by vibrunazo »

dagw wrote: post #33
edanm wrote: post #27

Great article. A side point, but one that is more interesting to me: in my social circle, I'm the only person who actually Googles everything. When I sit down to have a conversation with most people, and questions about facts come up, I instinctively start Googling. Almost no one else does this. People will prefer to spend an entire conversation trying to guess the population of e.g. Greece, rather than spend 5 secon…

And they don't seem much interested in the answer when I provide it, actually. I'm the sort of person who would happily spend an entire conversation trying to guess the population of Greece and frown upon anybody who tried to Google it. I like the fun, social 'game' of trying to work out random stuff from a few first principles . Having someone Google for it and tell me is like someone telling me the ending of a movi…

That's interesting. I didn't know people would think like that. Your post explains a lot, now the world makes much more sense. Thanks for posting it :)

Now I wish people online would put a huge disclaimer saying "I'm only interested in arguing for the fun of it, not in finding an actual solution" before their posts. That would have saved countless hours of online typing wasted for nothing.

I mean, nothing wrong with finding it fun to discuss. But I wish I could accurately tell when that's the person's goal, versus whether it's a person who actually finds solving real problems more fun than talking, like I do.

Well, anyway, already learned something new today. My day is complete.

edit: wow this is bigger than I thought, now I've been reading through older HN posts where I was mind-blown about "why would he even post that? What's his motivation?". Now I feel like I can finally make sense out of it. I feel so stupid for never noticing something so simple. The world is different now.

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