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Rating: 
Summary: Great guide to out of reach resources
Review: "The Invisible Web" is a thorough, thoughtful guide to finding information lying just outside the reach of search engines. It can be divided into two parts.The first part describes the strengths and weaknesses of search engines as tools for finding information on the World Wide Web and provides a good overview of the technical and business limitations that lead to the weaknesses. At the same time, the authors also provide a high-level explanation of how search engines operate and a comprehensive explanation of what types of resources are left out of search engine indexes. Although this section is a bit repetitive, it also stands as the best explanation I have encountered on the subject of Web resource accessibility (and inaccessibility) through the popular tools that searchers have at their disposal. The second part provides a list of Invisible Web resources (resources that can not be indexed by search engines), organized by subject, with annotations. I personally did not find this list comprehensive, but it is a good place to start for those who have previously relied solely on search engines and directories for Web searching. If you want to understand what resources are just beyond the grasp of search engines, and get a hand on them yourself, "The Invisible Web" is a great book to get you started. Note: some of the URL's sited in the second part of the book are now gone. This is not a criticism of the book, but a reflection of the ever-changing nature of the Web.
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Summary: Information overload with a vengeance!
Review: Although I haven't read the book, I'm giving it 5 stars based on one of the authors' websites, Price's List of Lists. Since reviews aren't supposed to include URLs, I'll suggest instead that you do a Google search on Prices List of Lists (no apostrophe). You'll get an idea of the extent of the information that Mr. Price has made available by his diligent searching. If the book is half as good as the website, it's a vital resource.
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Summary: Packs in rich sources
Review: As much as eighty percent of the authoritative information accessible over the Net doesn't appear on the popular search engines: so how can individuals access databases from universities, libraries, associations, and government agencies? The Invisible Web introduces over 1,000 major information sites and provides tips on how to search them. From vital statistics to public records and academic collections, The Invisible Web packs in rich sources.
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Summary: Excellent instruction for librarians . . .
Review: I retired five years ago after thirty years in a very large public library system, and recently found it necessary to return to the trenches for awhile, in a rather smaller system. In that half-decade, of course, the Internet changed drastically and, even though I'm constantly online and intimately familiar with the major search engines (and many of the minor ones), there was a large number of new reference information sources with which I was not at all familiar. So I went looking for professional tools to remedy my ignorance. This is the first book I've seen in the publisher's "CyberAge" series, and medthodologically, it's quite good. As others have noted, the static nature of print-on-paper means rapidly outdated material, but Sherman and Price show you how to attack the problem, so, even though I came across several (unfortunately) extinct databases, I was able to locate several new ones, too. This is a terrific instructional work for reference librarians, and the accompanying web site is near the top of my bookmarks at work.
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Summary: Great guide to out of reach resources
Review: Its always risky to buy a web guide, when by its own omission, half of the web sites will be dead in two years. My own use of the web addresses in the book, found a few dead, but the author's "invisible web" web site had updated links. As search engines get better the current "invisible webs" becomes more visible, and are probably replaced with a new class of invisible webs. My own recent search was able to find many of the "invisible sites" in this book, so perhaps this book is best at giving you ideas of how to search better, for example if your looking for books search for "Library of Congress". In the context of where this review is, Amazon is a great translucent source for info on books.
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Summary: Good source, but slowly becoming dated
Review: Its always risky to buy a web guide, when by its own omission, half of the web sites will be dead in two years. My own use of the web addresses in the book, found a few dead, but the author's "invisible web" web site had updated links. As search engines get better the current "invisible webs" becomes more visible, and are probably replaced with a new class of invisible webs. My own recent search was able to find many of the "invisible sites" in this book, so perhaps this book is best at giving you ideas of how to search better, for example if your looking for books search for "Library of Congress". In the context of where this review is, Amazon is a great translucent source for info on books.
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Summary: Can do better
Review: The autor can do better. The book are limited on few search engines, exitst most software that search all kind of data in the internet world better than this book.
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Summary: The Invisible Web: Uncovering Information Sources Search Eng
Review: Today, the Web is the first place people look for information. Unhappily, the retrieval tools used--search engines--are losing their effectiveness. An increasing percentage of the Web is "invisible" to search engines because of the technical and logistic limitations of current search engine technology. Unless users know where and how to search, much of the Web's most authoritative content is effectively invisible because it is so difficult to locate. Chris Sherman (associate editor of SearchEngineWatch.com ) and Gary Price (compiler of Price's List of Lists and The Virtual Acquisition Shelf and News Desk ) present an overview of what is known about search engine technology by focusing on problems in applying this technology to the rapidly expanding, evolving Web. Dynamic database-driven Web sites, Flash and Shockwave technology-driven Web sites, and password-protected Web pages (with free registration) are growing problems for today's search engines. Twenty-five "invisible" Web categories are explored, including authoritative dictionaries, historical documents, and philanthropy and company directories. The balance of the work consists of an annotated directory of almost 1,000 Web sources arranged by broad subject categories (e.g., art and architecture, business and investing, education, entertainment, government information, health information, legal information, real-time information, science) and a brief glossary of commonly misunderstood information retrieval terms. Information is kept current at . Strongly recommended for librarians and reference service staff in public, academic, and corporate libraries.
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Summary: The Invisible Web: Uncovering Information Sources Search Eng
Review: Today, the Web is the first place people look for information. Unhappily, the retrieval tools used--search engines--are losing their effectiveness. An increasing percentage of the Web is "invisible" to search engines because of the technical and logistic limitations of current search engine technology. Unless users know where and how to search, much of the Web's most authoritative content is effectively invisible because it is so difficult to locate. Chris Sherman (associate editor of SearchEngineWatch.com ) and Gary Price (compiler of Price's List of Lists and The Virtual Acquisition Shelf and News Desk ) present an overview of what is known about search engine technology by focusing on problems in applying this technology to the rapidly expanding, evolving Web. Dynamic database-driven Web sites, Flash and Shockwave technology-driven Web sites, and password-protected Web pages (with free registration) are growing problems for today's search engines. Twenty-five "invisible" Web categories are explored, including authoritative dictionaries, historical documents, and philanthropy and company directories. The balance of the work consists of an annotated directory of almost 1,000 Web sources arranged by broad subject categories (e.g., art and architecture, business and investing, education, entertainment, government information, health information, legal information, real-time information, science) and a brief glossary of commonly misunderstood information retrieval terms. Information is kept current at . Strongly recommended for librarians and reference service staff in public, academic, and corporate libraries.
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Summary: If you use the web, you need this book
Review: What a great book, essential reading for anyone who uses the web to find information. It explains, clearly and concisely, what the invisible web is (the 80% of the web that is NOT indexed by search engines) and why that material is 'invisible'. In addition, the book has 19 (!) chapters with descriptions of invisible web resources on topics ranging from health/medicine to news to science. This book should be on every web searcher's desk.
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