Issue Dramaturg

Information retrieval is normally not considered dramatic. On the Web, however, information sources are in constant competition with each other to be returned in the top ten for any given query. Govcom.org has developed a tool for the next phase in the research into the continuing drama of changing engine placement, showing for the first time a site's pagerank - per query. The output of the Issuedramaturg, a Google Actor-Issue PageRank Profiling tool, compares sites' engine ranking for the same issue, showing in refreshing, hyperlink economy-style graphs the lifts and the sags.

To create your own Issuedramaturg query over time, you require a special account for the Issuescraper.

• Log in to the Issuescraper.
• Begin new analysis with wizard and select 'Google Pagerank'
• Select a project or create a new project and give the project a title and description
• Enter term to be queried as well as a maximum of 3 URLs to be monitored. Click 'next'
• Wait until completion. This will take a minute
• Go to network manager and select your project
• Click 'edit', specify date range to one day (default is every 3 days) and click 'save'
• After two days, your query results will be visible in the Issuedramaturg

The Issuedramaturg captured the apparent removal of 911truth.org from Google results for the query "9/11" September-October 2007: http://issuedramaturg.issuecrawler.net/issuedramaturg_story/911truth.org.html