chosaq

Co-op Copyright Search

Recently, Google has added Custom Search Engine functionality to its Co-op offering. At first sight, this is similar to Rollyo’s service, but there are (at least) two extras:

  • You have the choice between searching through a list of selected sites only, or else, searching the entire web with a special emphasis on results from a selected number of sites. Biased search, if you will.
  • People can collaborate and add the sites they want to see included for a specific search.

Google Co-op logo

Now, in my research, I often find myself struggling with an overload of false positives, as the word “copyright” is mentioned on tons of websites that have nothing to do with the topic in question. As it seems that Google’s Co-op may be able to ease this problem, I’ve made a Custom Search Engine, called Co-op Copyright Search, that will rank results from e.g. BoingBoing or Lessig Blog higher than normal. Anybody can add sites and make the engine better — currently only 20 copyright related sites are included, but there’s room for 4980 more!

If you just want to try out the engine, go ahead: try Sony for instance, and you’ll see the difference with a normal Google search.

So, spread the word and contribute!

Update 2006-11-02: I’ve made an OpenSearch search engine plugin, so you add Co-op Copyright Search to the Firefox 2.0 search box. Get it here:

N.B.: this should work with IE7 too, but I’m getting errors — trying to figure out what I’m doing wrong.

Comments on “Co-op Copyright Search” (feed)

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  1. I like the playful subversion that this function provides, but it seems a perfect target for phishers.

    » Austin on October 26th, 2006 at 14:37

  2. Austin, I’m not sure I get your point. Why should this be a phishing target?

    » Andreas on October 26th, 2006 at 16:42

  3. Not the Copyright Co-op version, but other versions that rank spyware or phishing sites more highly could be used to phish google. Although the release of IE7 and FF2.0 may make this less of an issue in the future.

    » Austin on October 27th, 2006 at 03:16

  4. It’s an interesting theory, but I’m not convinced yet as to the positives of it.

    » Scott at Realepicurean on November 5th, 2006 at 04:37