Most search tools are designed to do a particular thing.
There's an old saying: to a person with a hammer, everything looks like a nail. Even though you know and love Google, it isn't always the best or most suitable tool to find all things on the web. If you need scholarly, academic articles, well, head over to the library website and look at the databases there because the publishers aren't interested in giving away that intellectual property for free. If you want a video, YouTube has your back. Below is a list of information "needs" and some focused search tools to find them
| Info Need | Free web tool | Fee web tool |
| Web Sites | ||
| Videos |
|
|
| Music | ||
| Images |
|
|
| Articles | ||
| Books |
|
|
| Government Documents | By definition, government documents are free, though some government services (such as ERIC or Medline) get repackaged with value-added services and offered for sale. There is still a free version though. | |
| Software Downloads |
|
|
| Quantitative data/statistics |
End of Module 1
