
The Bourne collection: the history of online search - dalke
https://computerhistory.org/blog/the-bourne-collection-online-search-is-older-than-you-think/
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tannhaeuser
Going by my recent experience with mainstream search engines (read: I don't
find shit anymore), I think the history of online search isn't closed yet. So
far I've come to the conclusion that the problem isn't one of neglect by the
likes of Google Search, DuckDuckGo, StartPage, etc. Rather, search engines do
their job just fine, there just seems to be no good new content out there to
search, and that has everything to do with the incentives that Google Search
sets (and perhaps slow retirement and/or disillusionment of the web enthusiast
generation). It'll be interesting to watch GOOG being torn between squeezing
the last femto-penny out of each and every visitor contact on the web and
elsewhere for growth, and at the same time seeing their cash cow fade as
content creators can't make a living on DoubleClick and YouTube pittances.

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dalke
I first came across Bourne because of his book "Methods of Information
Handling". Its masterful summary of the available methods well deserved the
American Documentation Institute Book-of-the-Year award.

It's available from archive.org via a 1 hour loan:
[https://archive.org/details/methodsofinforma0000unse](https://archive.org/details/methodsofinforma0000unse)
.

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Jaruzel
I recently stumbled over this list of old defunct Search Engines...

[http://www.jaruzel.com/textfiles/Old%20Web%20Info/Internet%2...](http://www.jaruzel.com/textfiles/Old%20Web%20Info/Internet%20Search%20Engines%20v2.61.txt)

It's sad that there's no real competition in online search anymore.

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stillbourne
Nice

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ravenide
Is this the bash dude?

~~~
adrianmonk
You mean the Bourne shell dude, and no, that is Stephen Bourne
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_R._Bourne](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_R._Bourne)).

bash and the Bourne shell aren't the same thing. More or less, this is the
history:

* in 1979, sh (Bourne SHell), created by Stephen Bourne, is released as part of AT&T Unix

* in 1983, ksh (Korn SHell), created by David Korn, an enhanced version of sh, is released by AT&T

* in 1989, bash (Bourne Again SHell), created by Brian Fox, is an open-source alternative released by the GNU project

