Google is not your friend

"Google is your friend"

I was loitering in the pub we call Twitter near closing time when I overheard the phrase. "Google is your friend". It was said as part of a Twitter conversation about the merit of information professionals in research.

"Google is your friend" "Information Professionals are obsolete"

The only proper response to this is: "F*ck off ya fud". [Ironically, best don't google search 'fud']

The reason this is the only response it deserves is because there is nothing else to say. Anyone who says "Google is your friend" loses this and any future argument about information management and research at that point. Anyone who says it is archaic, primordial, pond scum. Gloop. They no longer matter. They are anti-matter, vacuous. Nothing.

Quite aside the statement predisposes that Google is somehow the friend to those without access to the hardware to use it, the literacy to use it, the technological infrastructure to use it - it shows a lack of understanding of improving information provision and why it is important in society. Google in this statement shows a limited ambition. Google is good enough for the dross masses. It is the statement of the false bourgeois built on hollow straws.

Google is a commercial company and can and do change their motivations and mission statement based on capital theory, not for the good of information access. Google has abandoned it's primary operation to archive and protect the World's printed analogue and born-digital history. It is now about the money-making, patent-pending future.

The Google Books project has lost impetus and is out of funding and favour: Self-driving future cars are in.

"Google is your friend" "Google is your friend" "Let them eat cake"

The thing is, Google is your friend. Google is able to talk to you about pretty much anything you want. Sure some of what it talks about isn't always accurate, it hasn't always read up on a topic, sometimes it forgets things and sometimes it tells you just what you want to hear, but it is easy to talk to. You can have better relationships with other "friends" who can offer better advice, but Google keeps tagging along and wittering on over them. Google is your annoying old school friend who you worked with a couple of times on a class project. It's Google who turns up later to your office nights out and is reduced to telling old, hoary jokes for attention when the conversation goes over their head.

You could be introduced to other "friends" with good, respected specialised jobs - who are encouraged to be professional, continue in their development and take care of their health. Your friend Google is too ripped of its titties on sweet candy and sugar cane to care much about being professional. Professionalism is for squares - you see any squares in the word 'Google'? Google doesn't care, it's so pumped full of algorithms in its veins it has no idea what it is saying to you, just whatever comes to mind first, but it doesn't matter because Google is still talking to you, still your friend, right, buddy, right?

"Google is your friend" "Google is your embarrassing friend"

Let's drop this silly analogy for now. Let's have a practical example.

"Google is your friend"

You've been accused of a heinous crime. You're going to court. You know you're innocent but the details are complex. If you are found guilty it is career ruining at best, family disownment and a shiv in the eye down at the prison yard at worse.

Your lawyer comes in and says: "OK, I've sat with the ipad this morning on Google. I've found a few things which seem legit. Well, one of the things was, like, the 6th hit on page 1 - so that has to be hopeful, right? This one guy has a blog - I'm calling him as an expert witness. He is really opinionated on a lot of stuff, some of which involves your situation, kind of. It shouldn't be too hard to track him down because IJUDGETHEJUDGES is a fairly rare name, I reckon. I would have done more but I clicked on Google Images by mistake and then spent a fair bit of time searching for lawyer cartoons. I will charge you time for that, unfortunately."

OR, would you prefer if your lawyer comes in and says: "Good afternoon. I've been working on your case. The firm's professional information team has collated a dossier of supportive Good Law: authoritative case reports and the concerned legislation status at the time of your alleged crime. While they were doing this for me, I used my time to read through your details and start on how I'm going to develop your defence."

"Google is your friend" "Information Professionals are your best friends"

The world of information is expanding in preposterous directions and over mind bending mediums. Information Professionals should be in more demand than ever. There is sound reasoning for it. Information access and literacy is going to be ever more key in research and learning. If Google is the highest form of resource we can aim for, we are in trouble.

Information professionals are not against Google. Google is not a friend to an Information Professional. To them it is a tool. It has some advantages and some disadvantages. It doesn't search the Deep Web, but lets you track down a lot of populist facing materials which want to be freely found. It also has some fairly advanced tricks hidden away to help search it the most effectively, of which will be mainly unknown to the non-information professional.

An information professional will tell you Google is the last port in a research storm. You start with the information query and in a structured interview with the researcher, hone it to the most precise it can be. The information professional will help with interrogating the most suited resource, online or offline, to find the most authoritative information. They do this objectively. They do it without any sense of trying to promote one answer over another because they've not been paid to do that. They give the answer in the most useful format. The information professional also has the advantage of being in the best place to ask other information professionals and combine their skills for your benefit.

Information professionals enjoy giving good information, using trusted resources with efficiency and the occasional smile.

Google might be your friend, but with Information Professionals you are amongst friends.

Oh! Someone has just tweeted we don't need libraries because now there are Kindles.... Grrrrrrr!