I hate blogging. I've learned that much. I not really this behind, I've just been horribly slack keeping my blog.
For my search engine task, I chose the phrase "auditory processing disorder" as it was relevant for work. Using good old google, about 402 000 matches were made. The top listing was (drum roll please for this surprise...) Wikipedia. The top 5 were:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auditory_processing_disorder
http://www.nidcd.nih.gov/health/voice/auditory.htm
http://www.adhd.com.au/CAPD.htm
http://auditoryprocessing.com.au/1-auditory.html
http://www.nal.gov.au/Import%20web%20articles/CAPDTheory%20(ANZJA%202004)%20Wilson%20et%20al.pdf
I configured Copernic to search using every option available to me (why restrict things) and came up with 43 results, all of which used the exact phrase. Top of the list went to Hearing Life, funnily enough a sponsored link. So were the next 3.
http://www.hearinglife.com.au/
http://www.movetolearn.com.au/products-books.html?gclid=CNzgv4iuipUCFQ7jTAodXBoPrg
http://www.2enewsletter.com/welcome%20page.htm?gclid=CPKwh6euipUCFQ60TAodkzADrw
http://www.speechtherapy.com.au/
http://kidshealth.org/parent/medical/ears/central_auditory.html
Presumably this is because I had only installed the basic version as I prefer to try before I buy where possible , I did notice that a lot of options were not available to me. I liked the way searches were saved and I noticed if a search was re-opened the sponsored results were no longer at the top. My security suite, on the other hand, hated Copernic.
I have made more of an effort to look at alternative engines when I'm running searches at other times, but I have to admit being like a lot of people and using google almost by default without thinking about it. Bad habit, I know.
Ultimately it's about finding what you need and I guess if that happens it was a successful search.
