Daniel M. Russell

Daniel M. Russell is an American computer scientist.

Education

Russell graduated from University of California at Irvine with a B.S. in Information and Computer Science (1977). He received his M.S (1979) and Ph.D. (1985) in Computer Science from University of Rochester. His doctoral work was titled "Schema-Based Problem Solving" which was based on "using recombinations of pre-stored plans in sophisticated ways". While at University of Rochester, Russell did research work in "the neuropsychology of laterality, models of apraxia and aphasia, coordinated motor movements and computer vision". Until 2005, he engaged in understanding sensemaking behaviour of people dealing with mass information collection. He has also contributed in the design and use case studies in the BlueBoard system as a collaboration tool.

Russell worked at Google from 2005 until 2023, where he was a senior research scientist and lead for the research area of "Search Quality & User Happiness". He coordinated the development of two Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC) on effective searching skills which were launched in 2012 on PowerSearchingWithGoogle.com, which had more than 3 million students. In September 2019, MIT Press and Dr. Russell tweeted that 4.4M people have taken Power Searching with Google MOOC

He also led a Search Education team that developed A-Google-Day, launched April 11, 2011, a large-scale teaching system in which users can practice their searching skills with Google. and mentioned in an interview: "One statistic blew my mind. 90 percent of people in their studies don't know how to use CTRL/Command + F to find a word in a document or web page!". He creates videos ("1 Minute Morceaux" on his YouTube Channel) with which he wants to improve web literacy.

In 2019, Russell wrote an article for Scientific American called How to Be a Better Web Searcher: Secrets from Google Scientists, together with Mario Callegaro and published the book The Joy of Search: A Google Insider's Guide. It received generally favorable reviews. He teaches on the subject of effective web-search strategies, using large-scale teaching systems developed by him at Google. Russell sometimes refers to himself as a search anthropologist for his focus on user experience in web search and improving sensemaking of information with technology. Russell is also a Resident Futurist at University of Maryland, where he works for the Office of the vice-president for Research.

Russell has held research positions with IBM (as a senior research scientist, and briefly at a startup that developed tablet computers a few years before the iPad. ) and Xerox over the course of his career.

In 2023, Daniel Russell was laid off from Google as a part of its larger lay off of 12,000 employees.

Research Russell's research focus has been human experience with search engines and in large, complex collections of information. He aims to design comprehensible and intuitive ways for users to engage with information effectively.

In 2011, Russell taught effective searching skills and enhancing learning efficacy.

Authored publications and cited works

Russell's authored publications in topics including education innovation, human–computer interaction and visualization, information retrieval and the web, and mobile systems can be found on the Google AI website. His works are widely cited by other authors.

Personal life

Russell blogs on effective searching skills as well as his own investigations in sensemaking and information foraging.

Russell started writing his blog, SearchResearch, in 2010.

On October 23, 2013, Russell appeared on Lifehacker's "The How I Work series", interviewed by Tessa Miller. On it, Russell describes a day in his life, how he works and some personal topics

On August 9, 2017, his blog arrived to the first 1,000 posts.

Awards Russell was inducted into the CHI Academy (ACM) in 2016. He was added to the UC Irvine Information & Computer Science Department Hall of Fame in 2015. In 2013, Russell received the UC Irvine Bren School's 2013 Lauds & Laurels Distinguished Alumnus award.