10 of the BestOnline Research Tools

for journalists - Norwegian Online News

Association 2010

An introduction to a few intermediate and

advanced research tools

Colin Meek is Consulting Editor to Journalism.co.uk

He has delivered scheduled and in-house courses in Advanced Online Research to journalists, policy analysts and

market researchers for five years. In-house clients have included:

Oxford Analytica, Channel 4 (UK), Cornwall Energy, Verdens Gang (VG Norway), RPSGB and others

For more information see: http://www.journalism.co.uk/36/43/98/

Avoid confusion

Image licensed under creative commons: http://www.flickr.com/photos/tronics/380379732/

1: Google’s ‘advanced operators’ ... used to pin-point results that normal

search strategies can’t reach

You can use Google’s ‘advanced’ search form, but, used correctly, operators can cut to the

chase faster, giving you better and more focused results

Precision Surfing using google’s advanced operators

• Use advanced operators for more precision and flexibility.

• Type them directly into the google search field

• Command google to look only:

• at specific sites;

• for specific document types; or,

• for search terms in specific places.

Look at this search string:

business opportunities “london olympics” ~advice site:.com

• site:.com restricts the search to ‘.com’ websites only.

• ~advice searches for synonyms of advice such as ‘help’ or ‘guide’

• “london olympics” acts as a phrase search

• focused results

• from relevant agencies and companies

• Combine advanced operators with key search terms to craft precise search strings.

• Sometimes called ‘forensic surfing’

Combine operators for powerful search

Looking for case studies from official sources of swine flu outbreaks in UK schools:

site:.gov.uk “swine flu * schools” ~outbreak

Here, the asterisk acts as a wildcard for words between ‘swine flu’ and ‘schools’

Cases identifed in first page of

results...

For example:

site:.gov.uk “strictly confidential” filetype:doc staffing ~reductions

You can be creative with search terms in your area of interest

• focused leads

• worth exploring further

For a full description of google’s advanced operators see:

http://www.slideshare.net/ardessie

2: Google’s Timeline Tool

Instantly get a story in context and hunt down historical information on trending topics

Do a normal search - Go to ‘more options’ -

Select ‘Timeline’ - Select date range.

Drill down to reveal peaks in news interest

And access news coverage from those

dates.

3: Add ‘database’ to your key-word search term

If you are doing a story on any subject and you think a publicly accessible database (or official database) may exist - add the

word ‘database’ to a relevant keyword search

For example, if you are doing a story on anti-depressant medication in Norway?

Use this term in your search engine:

norway prescription database

That search returns the Norwegian Prescription Database as the first hit where you can interrogate prescription records

For more on the ‘hidden’ or ‘invisible’ web: http://bit.ly/19evws

4: Tweetdeck

Tweetdeck is an extraordinarily powerful tool that lets you monitor changing Twitter content in real-time

Download it free from tweetdeck.com

The respected web research blogger Phil Bradley on this month’s Mexican Earthquake:

Two hours after eye witness accounts started to appear - BBC News site had still failed to mention the earthquake...

Phil Bradley:

There really wasn't any doubt in my mind that Twitter is THE first place for news stories...

but the amount, the richness and variety of information is becoming quite astonishing.

The only thing that surprises me....is the inability of the traditional news media to keep up to date with what's going on.

And you know what - they can't. Because they can't be everywhere, in the way that Twitter is.

Me:

But, the next best thing to being everywhere, is to monitor the Web - including Twitter - effectively.

Create unique lists of twitter users to track subjects and news items.

Add search “columns” to track posts on specific terms.

Monitor specific users.

Message specific users.

From the same interface:

Turn posts into emails.

5: Use RSS to filter feeds

Stop hunting for news that you can monitor automatically. Configure tools correctly so your sources come to you.

Choose a RSS reader that lets you set up smart feeds to filter your subscriptions..

Which lets you set rules for which posts are included

If you do this well, and stay focused, you don’t have to

scroll through dozens or even

hundreds of blog posts.

6:Evernote

Lets you...........

Store web pages- clip them- annotate

- store pictures- create notes-share them- file them

- and much more

With an easy ‘webclipper’ button you can use directly

from your browser

Everything is searchable, including handwritten notes and images.

And your whole file of information is synced between your desktop computer and Evernote

online

7: Interclue

The browser plugin that lets you links; saving you from opening endless windows.

It also lets you:- save or email the snapshot of the page and gives you additional

data about the link.

An Interclue pop-up from a BBC news page letting you read the whole of a linked news story.

For more on improving your browser: http://bit.ly/2kR9B9

8: Google’s Cache

Google’s Cache is an under-used tool that lets you:- look back in time to when the page was last indexed by

Google;- lets you browse suspect sites anonymously; and,- can enable you to bypass site subscription fees.

Google’s cache of a page from the ‘Stormfront’ site

9: Collecta

One of the best new wave of real-time search engines that lets you monitor updating web content.

10: Yahoo Pipes

Here is a simple example that demonstrates the power of Pipes:

Here I created a pipe that extracts stories from official RSS feeds that contain one of the following terms:

It also converts a normal Google search into the RSS feed.

‘swine flu’‘h1n1’‘mrsa’‘norovirus’.

This pipe was created to track a brand mentioned in social media sites.

For more information on how to use Pipes:http://bit.ly/iDUT0 for a video demo and...

http://bit.ly/RRkQX, or http://bit.ly/9GShP for more advanced options.

Lots of other guides exist online