Google Scholar and finding useful stuff

I have a healthy scepticism for 'key performance indicators' and seem to spend half my life trying to work against the neoliberalizing processes reshaping the higher education landscape.  And I understand all the various issues concerning the interpretation of citation scores, etc.  Nevertheless, passing the 5,000 mark on Google Scholar earlier this week gave me a little smile.  It seems that some folk find some of the stuff I write useful (or at least cite it) and that total has the feel of some kind of landmark number even if it is completely arbitary.  I created the profile because I had to supply citation data in sum and for individual papers for a grant application I was writing and it was straightforward to use.

Where I'm finding it most useful, however, is with respect to the recommedations that it provides about papers it thinks I will find interesting based on my publication profile (what I'm writing about and who I cite).  Just this morning I discovered Jeremy Crampton et al's 'Beyond the geotag?' paper, that I now plan to read in the next couple of weeks (you just click on the 'My Updates' to see the latest suggestions).  I'm now discovering a whole rake of useful material in a timely fashion that I probably wouldn't have come across otherwise.  Might be worth checking out if, like me, you don't get to browse the literature as much as you'd like.