Saturday, March 26, 2011

Seeing is Believing?

One of the rules when doing research in the internet is to verify information gathered from the websites.

We normally focus this on "text-based" information and sometimes, images/ diagrams too... because we know that these are input by "human beings" and therefore to make sure we are 'reporting' the facts, we should do our due diligence to validate information.

Next... how about "outputs" generated by engines?
That rarely crossed our minds, I think!

For example, how often would we question the validity of information generated via the GoogleMap?
Do we take it as 100% correct? (Hm... I shall not use the word "truth").
How often do we ask ourselves, is what's presented in the GoogleMap always correct?

OK, this is different from the situation when the information presented by GoogleMap is updated or outdated (get what I mean?).

Here are 2 maps generated by GoogleMap, when the same information was fed into the site; however, different web-browsers were used: Internet Explorer and Firefox.

Take a look at the suggested route to I got from GoogleMap, to travel from my home at Tampines, the eastern part of the Singapore island to the school that is situated in the west :)

Map 1:

Map 2:

So, is seeing believing?

Hm... next question: what else could I use to validate or double confirm what's presented in the GoogleMap is correct?

Hm... based on my limited knowledge, it's by right, the most reliable online virtual map!xx

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

should try gothere.sg