sniffnoy | Am I the only one my age who doesn't use search engines constantly? (Reply)

It seems like lots of people use Google for every damn thing on the web, as their first source of information on a topic. Whereas to me, the broad nature of a search engine makes it the tool for when you have no idea what else to try. Certainly I use web search a good amount, but it's not something I use even every day; usually I have at least some idea where I might look something up.

Admittedly, for general things, this means I start by checking Wikipedia, which is arguably not much different. Just doing a straight-up search will not only get you the Wikipedia page if there is one, but also give results if there isn't one, and what to check next if there is. So that may actually be a better way of doing things. I'm just kind of uncomfortable with starting off by whacking at a problem with the most general hammer available.

-Harry