On Tue, 30 Oct 2001, Mike McConnell wrote:
> Dear Nicola,
>
> It was maybe just me, but the way I read your original email was that I
> should only reply to your message if I would follow option a). You said:
>
> 'If your answer is a) I would be interested to know how many guesses you
> would attempt before giving up / trying an alternative means.'
Um ... I was trying to elicit an a-d answer from everyone, and then
further info if a was the chosen answer. IWSWIM. Trying, but maybe not
succeeding. I _think_ the people who responded got my drift, tho'.
> I just don't believe more people guess URLs than try search engines,
> web-literate or not!
I think the important factor was 'well-known organisation', which I hope
would have affected people's responses. This (mis)information isn't trying
to suggest that people go about trying to guess urls for businesses or
institutions with long/complicated/obscure names.
What I'm interested in is, if you're not sure whether the url for Tesco
is tesco.com or tesco.co.uk, do you push a request through Google, or take
pot luck? There seems to be more pot luck going on than perhaps expected.
As I said, anyway, I don't think I'm ready to publish yet ;)
Nicola
> At 16:23 30/10/2001 +0000, you wrote:
> >Yes ... the moment you've all been waiting for! Thanks to everyone who
> >took part.
> >
> >Before I announce, I feel duty-bound to emphasise that these data are
> >probably not in any way useful ... the sample is very skewed and an amount
> >of interpretation was required in getting the 'results' as most people
> >gave more than one answer.
> >
> >
> >60 people replied.
> >
> >37 said they would guess first. Average (mean) number of guesses was 3;
> >range between 2-6.
> >
> >21 said that they would search first. Undisputed favourite search engine
> >is Google.
> >
> >2 said that they would use promotional materials if they were to hand.
> >No-one said they would seek out paper ... they would only use it if to
> >hand.
> >
> >No-one mentioned any other means.
> >
> >So ... who's going to survey the non computer literate public ...?
> >
> >Nicola
> >
> >Nicola Rogers Tel: 44 (0)1223 766809
> >WWW Editorial Officer Fax: 44 (0)1223 330262
> >University of Cambridge WWW: http://www.admin.cam.ac.uk/
> >The Old Schools Email: [log in to unmask]
> >Trinity Lane
> >Cambridge CB2 1TN
>
>
> ------------
> Mike McConnell
> Web Team Manager
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>
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