Introduction
While I appreciate that people think I’m some sort of research wizard, a priority for me has always been to find the most replicable and efficient way to do things. Over the past three years of doing “this” (whatever that means) I’ve managed to find a few methods that are easy, quick, and effective. The trifecta!
Using Google (yes THAT Google!) to perform targeted searches is one method that a lot of people don’t know how to utilize that I want to share with you today.
Please note, that while I am no stranger to censorship, I am using the Google method here because it works. Plain and simple. By using these methods you tend to circumvent the Google algorithm and cut through the BS. I will do an article on alternative tech methods sometime in the future, if that’s more up your alley.
I recorded an instructional video, which you can view below. Below the video I’ll lay out in more detail what I did, and give you links to examples of what I talked about.
Instructional Video
Instructions
First, you have to obviously have something in mind you want to search for.
In my video, I use the graphic novel Gender Queer: A Memoir by Maia Kobabe. This book has been highly controversial, because of its target audience (ages ) and the explicit pornographic nature of some of its pages.
In the below video, see a parent in the Adams12 Five Star School District in Colorado attempting to read from the book getting silenced by board members.
So, let’s say we want to find out which public schools are promoting this book.
Searching By Site Type
We can use the .edu domain to do just that. The .edu domain was originally intended for accredited post-secondary educational U.S. institutions. It is managed under the authority of the United States Department of Commerce. While it has expanded throughout the years to include other countries as well as colleges, it is predominantly still used for its original intended purpose.
So, we head off to google and type in: gender queer: a memoir maia kobabe + site:.edu
This narrows us down to 859 .edu websites that include this book. Happy digging!
But that’s definitely not all you can do with a quick and easy targeted search. Let’s say you want to circumvent all the bullshit and get straight to more academic or primary source materials.
Searching By File Type
You can do that by searching with a specific file type filter. I use this method in a vast majority of my research. Almost all of it actually. There are specific search engines that do this for you, but you can achieve the same goal with Google.
File Type: PDF
In the video, I wanted to search for results that would include Covid and Ivermectin in the same place. Obviously, many of those results are going to yield articles about who said what and a ton of opinion pieces and “official fact checker” tripe. Well, we want to find academic papers and other much more useful things.
So again, we head off to Google and we type in: covid ivermectin + filetype:pdf
The results are all going to be in PDF format and circumvent all the BS.
The first result is a paper published on August 18, 2022 involving a randomized trial of Metformin, Ivermectin, and Fluvoxamine for Covid-19.
Wasn’t that easy? But that’s not the only file type that I find handy.
File Type: Excel Spreadsheet
You might be a data oriented person, or you might just be curious what kind of Excel spreadsheets are out there involving topics you want to learn about.
Using the same topic, we change the file type to “XLS” and we can do just that.
So here we end up with 287 CSV Spreadsheets involving Covid and Ivermectin.
Note: When you click these links, it will initiate a download, so be sure you don’t mind downloading files before you click them!
The first result is honestly pretty incredible.
It’s a spreadsheet of nearly 11,000 academic papers relating to Covid. Once you’ve got it downloaded and cleaned up, you can add a filter and do quick and targeted searches in seconds. (I show how to do this in the video above if you are unsure how).
And there’s one last file type that I find either useful or interesting, and that is…
File Type: Powerpoint
Same thing, we head to Google but we use “filetype:ppt” to narrow our search.
There are four results, which are all interesting in their own way. You can use this to find presentations given by government officials, for example to find presentations given in PowerPoint format by including “filetype:ppt” as well as “site:.gov” to get results like this:
The sky is the limit, and the only limit is your ability to think of things to search for. 🙂
There’s one other way to target a search that’s super easy, which I’ll teach you now, and then you are free to be on your merry way.
Searching By Website
Sometimes you want to search for a specific subject by more than its domain identifier, like we did before with .edu and .gov. Let’s say, for example, you want to search for Environmental Social Governance (ESG) and you want to see results specifically from the World Economic Forum. All you need to know is the WEF’s site URL and you can do just that!
Just head to Google and type in: ESG + site:weforum.org
Blammo! Easy!
Conclusion
There are many other ways to conduct research, but these are some of the fastest, most reliable, and easy to accomplish.
I have a show called Big Dig Energy, which airs on Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday nights at 10/9c where you can watch and discuss what I’ve been digging into lately and learn more of those resources and techniques.
I try to be good about posting the replays here on the site, but you can always find them on my Rumble channel. That’s also where you can catch the show live if you are able.
Thank you for reading, I hope this helped!
– L
M says
The timing of this is perfect. I have just spent the last few days wading through the internet garbage to find facts vs. opinionated musings online. These tips will help me immensely.
Thanks
Andrew says
Thank you L for this how to guide. It definitely will make navigation easier.
Keep up the good work.
E says
Hi! So I get absolutely maddened when I see too many studies like “pollution causes heart problems in kids” etc lately. When I see one, sometimes I research the co-authors of the so-called study and they seem like complete fake bots. Do you ever come across this? Is there any way to call this practice out in the medical research world?
Jason Powers says
Great work GAL!
You rocking the BIG DICK energy!
(Sorry I’ve missed streams…work, new projects, you know the deal: 0.1% for the poor person.)