Way back in May, I wrote a post on context and search (http://www.marcmercuri.com/PermaLink,guid,9d050e2c-e3dc-4b16-953a-4ea7c2d48702.aspx). The post was prompted by something that was going on in the national media. Essentially, the US President's Press Secretary, Tony Snow, had come out and said that certain newspapers were being less than factual or selective in statistics they were reporting. In that post, I made a statement and a 'wouldn't it be cool' ask.
The statement was - set aside the politics for the context of discussion. The issue raised by Mr. Snow's statements questioned the level of trust associated with a particular periodical. Some people trust the Washington Post more than the New York times, that sort of thing. The 'wouldn't it be cool' ask was about custom search. Whether I'm searching on anything from presidential politics to the hottest new gadgets or the latest antics of Paris Hilton, I should be able to do that with a sense of context and trust.
At Microsoft, I attended a 'Search Mashup Day'. People across the company can get together, learn about search, throw out ideas, and for some of us, build out some mashups. My 'wouldn't it be cool' ask was the intended basis of my work at Search Mashup day. Unfortunately, the search guys made it too damn easy, so I finished up pretty quickly (a good problem!)
The Live Search guys implemented this via something they call a search macro. You can create one in less than 10 minutes.
Step 1. go to http://search.live.com/macros
Step 2. Select Basic and click the Next Button
Step 3. Enter in the news / gossip sites you want to include in your custom search engine.
Here's a sample list of some of the more popular news and gossip sites (remember, only copy in the web addresses from the first column):
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http://www.abcnews.com |
ABCNEWS |
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http://abcnews.go.com/sections/politics/TheNote/TheNote.html |
ABCNEWS THE NOTE |
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http://adage.com/news_and_features/deadline/index.html |
AD AGE DEADLINE |
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http://www.amconmag.com |
AMERICAN CONSERVATIVE |
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http://news.bbc.co.uk/default.stm |
BBC |
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/news/summary.ram |
BBC AUDIO |
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http://www.billboard.com |
BILLBOARD |
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http://www.boston.com/globe |
BOSTON GLOBE |
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http://news.bostonherald.com |
BOSTON HERALD |
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http://www.tvinsite.com/broadcastingcable/index.asp?layout=webzine |
BROADCASTING & CABLE |
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http://www.cbsnews.com |
CBS NEWS |
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http://inside.c-spanarchives.org:8080/cspan/cspan.csp?command=dschedule |
C-SPAN SCHEDULE |
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http://www.chicagotribune.com |
CHICAGO TRIB |
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http://www.suntimes.com |
CHICAGO SUN-TIMES |
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http://www.csmonitor.com |
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE |
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http://www.cnn.com |
CNN |
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http://cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/index.html |
CNN TRANSCRIPTS |
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http://www.variety.com |
DAILY VARIETY |
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http://www.washtimes.com/national/daybook.htm |
D.C. DAYBOOK |
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http://www.eonline.com/index.jsp |
E! |
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http://www.economist.com |
ECONOMIST |
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http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/index.jsp |
EDITOR & PUBLISHER |
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http://www.emiratestodayonline.com |
EMIRATES TODAY |
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http://www.emergency.com/ennday.htm |
EMERGENCY NET |
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http://www.empireonline.co.uk/site/news/index.asp |
EMPIRE [MOVIES] |
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http://www.pathfinder.com/ew |
ENT WEEKLY |
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http://www.ft.com |
FINANCIAL TIMES |
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http://www.forbes.com |
FORBES MAG |
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http://www.foxnews.com |
FOX NEWS |
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http://www.gawker.com |
GAWKER |
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http://www.hellomagazine.com |
HELLO! |
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http://www.hillnews.com |
HILL |
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http://www.hollywoodreporter.com |
HOLLYWOOD REPORTER |
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com |
HUFFINGTON POST |
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http://www.humanevents.com |
HUMAN EVENTS |
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http://www.insightmag.com |
INSIGHT MAG |
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http://www.iht.com |
INTERNATIONAL HERALD TRIB |
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http://www.investors.com |
INVEST BUS DAILY |
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http://www.jpost.com |
JERUSALEM POST |
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http://www.jewishworldreview.com |
JEWISH WORLD REVIEW |
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http://www.dailynewslosangeles.com |
LA DAILY NEWS |
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http://www.latimes.com |
LA TIMES |
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http://www.lexisnexis.com/news |
LEXISNEXIS NEWS |
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http://www.lucianne.com |
LUCIANNE.COM |
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http://www.mediaresearch.org |
MEDIA CHECK |
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http://www.medialifemagazine.com |
MEDIA LIFE |
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http://www.mediaweek.com |
MEDIA WEEK |
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http://www.msnbc.msn.com |
MSNBC |
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http://www.muchmusic.com/news |
MUCHMUSIC |
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http://www.TheNation.com |
NATION |
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http://www.nationalenquirer.com |
NATIONAL ENQUIRER |
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http://www.nationalreview.com |
NATIONAL REVIEW |
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http://www.thenewrepublic.com |
NEW REPUBLIC |
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http://www.nydailynews.com/news/todays_headlines |
NY DAILY NEWS |
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http://www.observer.com |
NY OBSERVER |
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http://www.nypost.com |
NY POST |
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http://www.nytimes.com |
NY TIMES |
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http://www.newyorker.com |
NEW YORKER |
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http://newsbusters.org |
NEWSBUSTERS |
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http://www.newsbytes.com |
NEWSBYTES |
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http://www.newsmax.com |
NEWSMAX |
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http://www.newsweek.com |
NEWSWEEK |
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http://www.kcna.co.jp/index-e.htm |
N. KOREAN NEWS |
|
http://www.people.com |
PEOPLE MAG |
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http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer |
PHILLY INQUIRER |
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http://www.philly.com/mld/dailynews |
PHILLY DAILY NEWS |
|
http://www.radioandrecords.com |
R & R |
|
http://www.reasonmag.com |
REASON MAG |
|
http://www.rollcall.com |
ROLL CALL |
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http://www.sky.com/skynews/home |
SKY NEWS |
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http://www.slate.com/Code/TodaysPapers/TodaysPapers.asp |
SLATE: PAPERS |
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http://thesmokinggun.com |
SMOKING GUN |
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http://www.starmagazine.com |
STAR |
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http://www.smh.com.au/text/index.html |
SYDNEY MORNING HERALD |
|
http://time.com |
TIME MAG |
|
http://www.TMZ.com |
TMZ |
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http://www.tvweek.com |
TELEVISIONWEEK |
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http://www.tvspy.com/shoptalk.cfm |
TV SHOPTALK |
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http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/dailymail/home.html |
[U.K.] DAILY |
|
MAIL |
|
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http://www.mirror.co.uk |
[U.K.] DAILY MIRROR |
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http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news |
DAILY RECORD |
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http://www.thisislondon.com/news |
[U.K.] EVENING STANDARD |
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http://www.express.co.uk |
[U.K.] EXPRESS |
|
http://www.guardian.co.uk |
[U.K.] GUARDIAN |
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http://www.independent.co.uk |
[U.K.] INDEPENDENT |
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http://www.newsoftheworld.co.uk |
[U.K.] NEWS OF THE WORLD |
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http://www.megastar.co.uk/site/today/news/latest/index.html |
[U.K.] |
|
STAR |
|
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http://www.thesun.co.uk |
[U.K.] SUN |
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http://www.telegraph.co.uk |
[U.K.] TELEGRAPH |
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http://www.thetimes.co.uk |
[U.K.] TIMES |