Trending: Library’s real-time search results offer ‘glimpse inside brain of Toronto’

By News Staff

What do Freud, a Bon Jovi CD, and industrial style design all have in common?

They were all searched through torontopubliclibrary.ca on Tuesday.

How do we know?

With the help of Google Analytics, the forward-thinking library has launched a public web portal that publishes real-time search engine results, giving viewers a rare glimpse into thousands of collective, eclectic queries.

Whether you’re searching for something from a computer at your local branch, a mobile device, or a home computer, the result will be published if it was punched into the library’s website.

Toronto Public Library (TPL) hosted an Ask Me Anything (AMA) on Reddit Tuesday, and the dashboard was a hot topic.

A TPL spokesperson likened it to a “glimpse inside the brain of Toronto” with practical applications as well.

“We do pay attention to what users enter into the search field,” TPL said. “We sometimes make adjustments to the search engine based on what we know about the types of searches people are doing.”

“And we just find it fascinating to see what people are looking for.”

On Tuesday that included things like: Mexican snacks, essential oils, buying a home, camping, interior design, The Catcher in the Rye, art crime and Dan Ackroyd (sic) to name just a few.

Some found further entertainment watching people make a mockery of spelling and grammar.

“The search dashboard is my new favourite thing,” wrote EVERYWHEREASIGN on Reddit. “Someone is trying to spell “mohicans” and they seem to be getting more and more desperate.”

There is a slight lag, depending on how many searches are taking place at once. But it works. We even tested it just to make sure.

CITYNEWSROCKS

 

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