Coffee on the Keyboard

I know people who will disagree—vehemently—with this statement, but Google is not the ultimate source of all knowledge in the universe.

Neither is Yahoo, nor Ask, nor Cuil.

What is the point of all this social networking if we are unable to tap that network for information from time to time? Sure, we can say “just fucking google it,” but can we always follow through?

When to Ask

“How do you spell ‘psychologist?’”

“Look it up in the dictionary.”

“If I could do that, I wouldn’t be asking.”

Sometimes you know so little about a subject that you don’t know how to form the question for Google. Dictionaries don’t help you spell.

In general, if you’re near someone who probably knows the answer: ask. If they know, you’ll get a more helpful, faster answer, and you can ask follow up questions.

Say, for example, you’re working on a project and are new to the language. If your colleagues have been around for a while, they probably know more than you. Ask away.

No harm in throwing a question to Twitter, either. You may not get an answer, but maybe you will. I once got a great answer from a follower before I got to page 2 of the Google search result. (Not to mention I was barking up the wrong tree with my search.)

When to Google

What if the person you ask doesn’t know?

Don’t make them do your googling for you.

If they don’t know, or can’t do more than point you in the right direction, you should be just as capable of looking things up for yourself. You’ll have to sort through some things, read a few pages that don’t help, but so would the person you asked. Don’t waste two people’s time.

If you do throw out a question on Twitter, or your prefered social network, don’t sit around and wait for an answer. You should be doing your own research. The network might not come up with anything.

People > Google

Yes, really. (No, not all of them.) Asking your network (people both physically or digitally accessible) will often yield better, faster results. But don’t belabor the point.

How long does it take to say “Anybody know…”?

Today I upgraded from WordPress 2.3.3 to 2.6.1. I’m such a late adopter sometimes.

I had to go through and repeat a few hacks. For example, 2.3.x didn’t allow you to do get_sidebar($name), so I’d hacked the “get_sidebar()” function. And I replaced the still-broken Atom feed reading widget with James Wilson’s Google Reader Widget.

Then I finally got fed up with the default “Search” widget, which doesn’t look like the other widgets at all (no title), so I started hacking into that one. Then I realized “why hack, when I can extend?”

So, here it is, Better Search Widget.

All it does is add a search widget with a customizable title, submit button, and field size. Quick-and-useful. You can see the results in the sidebar.

If you decide to use it, leave a comment and I’ll check out your blog.

Last week, as I was demonstrating Ning in my office, someone asked me how I find things like this. Honestly, I could not remember when or how I discovered Ning, which prompted me to pay attention over the past week, and to ask you.

(It was also a good excuse to write a short post since I’m still recovering from some wrist strain.)

So what did I find in the past week or so, and where did I find it? Twitter, unsurprisingly, has been the best source, though not always directly. Second best is what I’ll call “secondary finds,” when I visit one project and then follow to the author’s other projects. Blogs were a close third.

I should admit that I didn’t keep notes or stats, but I’m fairly good at keeping track of things like this, so I trust my own numbers.

CheckYesOrNo.info is a nifty, Twitter-friendly site for yes-or-no poll questions like “Will you participate in Mozilla’s FF3 Download Day June 17th?” (Yes.) Found it when @benrasmusen tweeted a question.

Issuu is a publishing social network. They have some kinks to work out but I see definite potential here. Found it when my cousin tweeted a link.

Twingly is like Technorati reborn, a new, more focused blog search tool. Chris Brogan blogged about it.

LaterLoop helps you store sites to read later. Very popular on Twitter.

TimeToMeet.info is from the same people as LaterLoop, and is a very slick multi-timezone meeting planner.

These are just some of the highlights of this week. I’ve perused quite a few little projects here and there, some good, some bad. I think there are three things that lead to discoveries like this:

Keep your eyes open. When people link something, check it out (or use LaterLoop and do it later).

If you see a link like http://checkyesorno.info/93, try getting rid of the “93″ and visit the site itself. Visit the site, not just the page.

If you like a site, scroll down and look at the footer. Most projects, particularly by independent developers and small companies, have links to the developer’s site, which probably has links to other projects. Look at their other projects. If someone had one good idea and put it together, odds are they’ve had others.

Any more ideas from out there in the blogosphere?

In lieu of a guest post, I’m just going to ask a question:

What is your best source for finding new things on the web?

Do you rely on search engines and find what you need when you need it? Do you check out the sites linked by Twitter pals? Read 200 blogs?

And a follow-up: What’s the coolest thing (blog, app, service, whatever) you’ve found on the web this week?

I’ll post my answer as soon as my wrists heal.

A debate has cropped up over “designed by” links, those (hopefully) little links a designer puts on a page to take credit and get themselves some traffic and customers.

On the one side, Pat Dryburgh argues word-of-mouth is superior to self-advertising: “If the design is good enough, they will ask my clients, and if they like me enough, then they will tell people about me.”

In rebuttal, Sophia Lucero at wisdump.com claims your “designed by” link should be like a Louis Vuitton logo: “Your brand should never hurt your creations, it should enhance them”.

To me, there is an issue of “ownership” to consider. If I put my name on something, I take responsibility for it as much as credit. My name means “I did this, I’m proud of it, and I want to be associated with it.” I think we’ve all done work we’ve left our names off, because we were rushed or a client demanded changes in spite of our best advice or… well, you get the idea: we weren’t proud of it.

So what do you do? Are you a “designed by” designer? Do you stick to code comments? What if you’re a back-end developer?

Edit: I should link Chris Brogan’s series on personal branding. It definitely applies to this question.