Construção do conhecimento em tempos atuais: os problemas da utilização do Google como principal fonte de pesquisa

Este artigo sinaliza algumas das contribuições da Internet para a gestão e construção do conhecimento nos últimos 20 anos. Posteriormente é discutido como empresas privadas, especificamente o Google,  tem determinado o modo pelo qual as pessoas tem acesso à vasta quantidade de informação disponível online. A invasão de privacidade e o fornecimento de resultados personalizados conforme o perfil de cada pessoa, também são tratados neste trabalho, bem como os riscos decorrentes disto. Por fim, são propostas algumas medidas para que os indivíduos não permaneçam presos a um ciclo de informações repetidas, e assim tenham acesso a conteúdos que antes não estariam ao seu alcance virtual

Evangelizing the ‘Gallery of the Future’: a Critical Analysis of the Google Art Project Narrative and its Political, Cultural and Technological Stakes

This thesis explores the digitization initiative Google Art Project and the ways in which the Project negotiates its place between rapidly developing Web technologies and the often-contradictory fine art tradition. Through the Project’s marketing and website design, Google constructs a narrative that emphasizes the democratization of culture, universal accessibility and a new progressive future for the art world while obscuring more complex political, social and cultural questions. Bringing together scholarship from various disciplines including library studies, digital studies, art history, and cultural studies this thesis highlights how the Project might open up a space to talk about art publics and the desire for openness in the art institution while also recognizing how GAP remains firmly planted within that institutional structure

O conteúdo é rei? Fatores determinantes para uma estratégia de SEO focada no Google

Dissertação de mestrado apresentada à Escola Superior de Comunicação Social como parte dos requisitos para obtenção de grau de mestre em Publicidade e Marketing.A presente dissertação baseia-se na famosa expressão “o conteúdo é rei” dita por Bill Gates em 1996. A pergunta de partida é “Para o Google, o conteúdo é o fator mais importante numa estratégia de SEO?”, procurando responder à seguinte hipótese: i) Para a Google, o conteúdo é o fator mais importante numa estratégia de SEO. Nesta investigação são selecionados os fatores a serem abordados, através da junção daqueles que são os fatores mais relevantes para os profissionais de referência em SEO. Posteriormente são analisados quantitativamente em 12 websites portugueses de literacia financeira, através de várias ferramentas, sendo a principal o Ubersuggest. A utilização de outras ferramentas prendeu-se com a impossibilidade de analisar todos os aspetos apenas no Ubersuggest. Por outro lado, também foram analisados fatores diretamente nos websites, inclusivamente no código. Os dados foram extraídos, apresentados, e explicados, para que posteriormente tenham sido comparados com o tráfego dos websites, de modo a perceber a relação entre cada um dos fatores e o número de visitas. Assim, tornou-se possível descobrir que o conteúdo não é o fator mais importante numa estratégia de otimização para motores de pesquisa.ABSTRACT: This dissertation is based on the famous expression "content is king" said by Bill Gates in 1996. The starting question is "For Google, is content the most important factor in an SEO strategy?", seeking to answer the following hypothesis: i) For Google, content is the most important factor in an SEO strategy. In this research, the factors to be addressed are selected, by gathering those that are the most relevant factors for SEO reference professionals. Later, they are quantitatively analyzed in 12 Portuguese financial literacy websites, through several tools, the main one being Ubersuggest. The use of other tools was due to the impossibility of analyzing all aspects only in Ubersuggest. On the other hand, factors were also analyzed directly on the websites, including in the code. The data were extracted, presented, and explained, so that they could later be compared with the websites' traffic, in order to understand the relationship between each of the factors and the number of visits. In this way, it became possible to discover that content is not the most important factor in a search engine optimization strategy.N/

Restricting the View and Connecting the Dots — Dangers of a Web Search Engine Monopoly

Everyone realizes how powerful the few big Web search engine companies have become, both in terms of financial resources due to soaring stock quotes and in terms of the still hidden value of the wealth of information available to them. Following the common belief that "information is power" the implications of what the data collection of a de-facto monopolist in the field like Google could be used for should be obvious. However, user studies show that the real implications of what a company like Google can do, is already doing, and might do in a not too distant future, are not explicitly clear to most people. Based on billions of daily queries and an estimated share of about 49% of the total Web queries [Colburn, 2007], allows predicting with astonishing accuracy what is going to happen in a number of areas of economic importance. Hence, based on a broad information base and having the means to shift public awareness such a company could for instance predict and influence the success of products in the market place beyond conventional advertising or play the stock market in an unprecedented way far beyond mere time series analysis. But not only the mining of information is an interesting feature; with additional services such as Google Mail and on-line communities, user behavior can be analyzed on a very personal level. Thus, individual persons can be targeted for scrutiny and manipulation with high accuracy resulting in severe privacy concerns. All this is compounded by two facts: First, Google's initial strategy of ranking documents in a fair and objective way (depending on IR techniques and link structures) has been replaced by deliberatively supporting or ignoring sites as economic or political issues are demanding [Google Policy: Censor, 2007]. Second, Google's acquisition of technologies and communities together with its massive digitization projects such as [Burright, 2006] [Google Books Library, Project, 2006] enable it to combine information on issues and persons in a still more dramatic way. Note that search engines companies are not breaking any laws, but are just acting on the powers they have to increase shareholder value. The reason for this is that there are currently no laws to constrain data mining in any way. We contend that suitable internationally accepted laws are necessary. In their absence, mechanisms are necessary to explicitly ensure web content neutrality (which goes beyond the net neutrality of [Berners-Lee, 2006]) and a balanced distribution of symbolic power [see Couldry, 2003]. In this paper we point to a few of the most sensitive issues and present concrete case studies to support our point. We need to raise awareness to the threat that a Web search engine monopoly poses and as a community start to discuss the implications and possible remedies to the complex problem

Restricting the view and connecting the dots: Dangers of a web search engine monopoly

Everyone realizes how powerful the few big Web search engine companies have become, both in terms of financial resources due to soaring stock quotes and in terms of the still hidden value of the wealth of information available to them. Following the common belief that “information is power” the implications of what the data collection of a de-facto monopolist in the field like Google could be used for should be obvious. However, user studies show that the real implications of what a company like Google can do, is already ..

A UX model for the evaluation of learners' experience on lms platforms over time

Although user experience (UX) is dynamic and evolves over time, prior research reported that the learners' experience models developed so far were only for the static evaluation of learners' experiences. So far, no model has been developed for the dynamic summative evaluation of the UX of LMS platforms over time. The objective of this study is to build a UX model that will be used to evaluate learners' experience on LMS over time. The study reviewed relevant literature with the goal of conceptualizing a theoretical model. The Stimuli-Organism-Response (SOR) framework was deployed to model the experience engineering process. To verify the model, 6 UX experts were involved. The model was also validated using a quasi-experimental design involving 900 students. The evaluation was conducted in four time points, once a week for four weeks. From the review, a conceptual UX model was developed for the evaluation of learners' experience with LMS design over time. The outcome of the model verification shows that the experts agreed that the model is adequate for the evaluation of learners' experience on LMS. The results of the model validation indicate that the model was highly statistically significant over time (Week 1: x2(276) = 273 I 9.339, Week2: x2(276) = 23419.626, Week3: x2(276) =18941.900, Week4: x2(276) = 27580.397, p=000<0.01). Each design quality had strong positive effects on the learners' cognitive, sensorimotor and affective states respectively. Furthermore, each of the three organismic states: cognitive, sensorimotor, and affective, had strong positive influence on learners' overall learning experience. These results imply that the experience engineering process was successful. The study fills a significant gap in knowledge by contributing a novel UX model for the evaluation of learners' experience on LMS platforms over time. UX quality assurance practitioners can also utilize the model in the verification and validation of learner experience over tim

Gestão de documentos de arquivo com uso de sistemas em software de código aberto

A Gestão de Documentos de Arquivo é um processo essencial para as Organizações Públicas ou Privadas e para indivíduos focando-se no registo, descrição, acesso e preservação dos documentos associados às suas atividades. Cada vez mais organizações e indivíduos têm de gerir enormes massas documentais não se referindo estes documentos apenas a textos escritos, mas também arquivos fotográficos, sonoros, entre outros. Entretanto o crescimento da massa documental digital, com as evoluções tecnológicas dos últimos anos, tem vindo a acelerar, contrariamente ao suporte físico, que cada vez mais é digitalizado e destruído ou simplesmente substituído pelo formato digital. A evolução dos Sistemas de Informação permitiu avanços na Gestão de Documentos de Arquivo, pois facilitou a sua operacionalização, contribuindo para maturar práticas e conceitos. Em especial, o movimento do Software Livre trouxe novos sistemas nas mais diversas áreas, incluindo as da Gestão de Documentos de Arquivo. A implementação mais alargada destes sistemas trouxe a descoberto necessidades que podem ser colmatadas com implementações de arquiteturas mais modernas, garantindo maior elasticidade e disponibilidade. Ao verificar a existência limitada de investigações sobre este tema, esta dissertação procura, em termos gerais, identificar se é possível implementar um Sistema de Gestão de Documentos de Arquivo unicamente com software livre. No âmbito da investigação, foi necessário identificar os principais requisitos alinhados com normas e standards relevantes, criar um modelo conceptual para selecionar implementações e, criar um protótipo que demonstre ser possível resolver o problema definido. A investigação foi conduzida socorrendo-se da metodologia DSRM, ao realizar cada uma das atividades definidas, aplicando-as ao problema e objetivos da dissertação. Finalmente, a investigação demonstra, através da concretização do modelo conceptual, desenhado a partir das técnicas investigadas e descritas na revisão de literatura, que é possível implementar um Sistema de Gestão de Documentos de Arquivo, com Software Livre ou de Código Aberto.Document Management is an essential process for Public or Private Organizations and also for individuals, that focuses in recording, describing, accessing and preserving documents linked to their activities. In an increasing matter, individuals and organizations need to manage huge amounts of documents, these documents not being solely text-based but also photographic archives, sound archives, among others. Meanwhile the growth of digital assets, with all the technological evolution from the past years, has been accelerating, and the physical assets have been decreasing in proportion, as they are mostly scanned and destroyed or simply replaced by a digital format. The evolution of Information Systems allowed breakthroughs in Document Management as it has facilitated it’s operationalization, contributing to practices and concept maturity. In particular, the Free Software Movement brought a wave of new systems in the most diverse fields, including Document Management. The increase in implementations in the field uncovered new requirements that can be covered with the use of modern architectures, that warrant more elasticity and availability. Observing the limited amount of investigations on this theme, this dissertation aims, in general, to identify if it is possible to implement a Document Management System only with Open Source Software. Within the scope of the research, it was necessary to identify the main requirements aligned with relevant norms and standards, create a conceptual model to select implementations and, create a prototype that demonstrates that it is possible to solve the defined problem. The research was conducted using the DSRM methodology, by performing each activity defined, applying them to the problem and goals of the dissertation. Finally, the research demonstrates, through the implementation of the conceptual model, designed based on the investigated techniques and described in the literature review, that it is possible to implement a Document Management System, with Free or Open Source Software