Last week at a Lancup a local Tweetup in Lancaster we were discussing search and a number of people commented that they noticed real-time search was not showing up in their regular search results. Well guess what, that’s because Google has given real-time search a new home. The page is www.google.com/realtime. Or go to the “Updates” link on the left side of normal search results.
There are also some cool new tools included in the new location. There is geographic filtering so you can find updates near you or if you are visiting Lancaster PA, you could search for what is happening right now in Lancaster. A conversation view has also been added, so you can follow discussions as the happen in real-time. Normally you need to click through a bunch of links to figure out what is being discussed and this can often be disjointed. With the “full conversation” function the tweets are organized from the newest to the oldest, giving a better real-time overview.
Google has also added real-time functions to Google Alerts. You can set up an alert to send you an email as soon as your topic shows up on Twitter and other microblogging services. You can also set it to email you once per day or week.
There is also a graph across the top of the results that shows you an idea of how hot a topic is. Check out the image below.
The new Realtime Search and updates via Google Alerts are now available in 40 languages around the world and the geographical filtering as well as the conversation views are available in English, Japanese, Russian and Spanish.
Google also posted a demo video for how to use the new features.
