I’m really, really trying to be positive about new tools lately, but after playing with Google Trends, I can’t really get excited.
According to Steve Rubel:
Google Trends analyzes a portion of Google searches to compute how many searches have been done for certain terms relative to the sum total. It includes a news-volume graph too that shows you the number of times your topic appeared in Google News stories. Unfortunately, unlike Google Finance it does not include blogs. This is a lost opportunity given Google’s interest in furthering peer-to-peer media. You can compare up to five terms by separating each term with a comma.
But it appears to be quite an inconcise science at this stage. For example, try a comparison between Weblogs Inc and Gawker Media, it’s nearly impossible, limit it down to Weblogs v Gawker, and you get this:
Yep, apparently more people in Iran read Gawker Media and Weblogs Inc, at least according to Google.
It’s a start I suppose. Anyone want to take bets about how long this one stays in beta? 🙂
