For those of us that rely heavily on date limits when using Google to search, ResearchBuzz has written an interesting post on Google News and date limit options. In it it as noted that “if you search Google News for news from the last hour you see things you will not see if you search for news from the last 24 hours” even though it seems evident “that searching for news items from the last 24 hours would encompass all the items found in the last hour.” Examples are given.
It is made clear that the author is “not faulting Google for this or calling it out or whatever. It’s just the way the Google News search works.”
Also, if you use Google Alerts, the author noted “at least two examples where a story found using a search term I’m monitoring did not appear to end up in my Google Alerts. I haven’t done any rigid, thorough searching, though, so don’t take my results as gospel.”
In summary:
- Be more “vigilant about searching Google News directly instead of relying on Google Alerts”
- “Use both 24-hour and past hour date searches”