California State University (CSU) has been studying how Freshmen use internet, with a view to implementing a technology literacy test.  This is interesting in terms of how people find things, and probably goes some way to explain why spam and phishing continue to succeed. 

The difference between intelligent browsing, and anything else is summarised by this quote.

“It actually makes you think about how you do research,” Juarez said. “I would just assume if it was the first thing that popped up, it was up to date.”

Source: Technology News: Trends: Generation M’s Surprising Struggle With Tech Literacy

This research is aimed at Gen M, born since 1986.  The good news would be that similar research aimed at how that age sourced books and encyclopedia’s 25 years earlier, would have produced similar concerns with the quality of the search for information.

The difference for Gen M compared to previous generations, is that the potential exists for smart tools that will help to provide support for intelligent searching.  A good example would be the Wikiasari item we noted in yesterdays Times, also picked up and expanded on at Techcrunch. 

However, no amount of tool smartness will protect some from just accepting what they see at face value.