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Google Memory Loss

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Re: Google Memory Loss

#361

Post by m12k »

shangxiao wrote: post #335
m12k wrote: post #324

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you really intend to call her "rackless Ruth" or was the slur an accidental misspelling of reckless? Because pointless and crude name-calling like that really detracts from any valid points you might have brought up.

According to Merriam-Webster [1] "rackless" is a variant of "reckless". [1] https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/rackless

Do you consider it likely that the poster I replied to routinely uses the dialectal variant rackless over the common spelling reckless?

Re: Google Memory Loss

#362

Post by pmlnr »

greenhouse_gas wrote: post #300
propman wrote: post #282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The little passionate website in the 2000s used to be the best source of information if properly vetted. Now it's only big websites regurgitating the same superficial content written by paid writers who have no expertise in the subject matter. They instead just copy other superficial sources. I think this has dumbed down society because it certainly has dumbed down me. Also, complicated topics are dumbed down to 1 se…

On the other hand, from my experience: I wanted to see how Raspberry Pi assembly worked - quite a niche subject (who programs? In assembly? On a Raspberry Pi?). Yet I found quite a few blogs going through the subject - a tutorial of sorts. I was also looking up how to write an OS (just for fun) - another fairly niche field. Yet I found tons of tutorials in C, C++, and Rust. I remember trying the same in the 1990s. Na…

That is not related to the search engine itself, this is due to the amount of content available now compared to the 90s.

Re: Google Memory Loss

#363

Post by pmlnr »

Joe-Z wrote: post #348

>My men­tal mod­el of the Web is as a per­ma­nen­t, long-lived store of humanity’s in­tel­lec­tu­al her­itage. And that's where I don't agree with the author. I've been thinking about this and to me it seems we need to try to foster a culture of forgetting. Just because we can store everything forever, doesn't mean we should. That kind of thinking is exactly where this 'track everything everyone does'-mentality comes…

I wrote about this when I dropped a lot of content from my site: https://petermolnar.net/making-things-private/

Re: Google Memory Loss

#364

Post by cup-of-tea »

m12k wrote: post #324
telltruth wrote: post #252

I'm wondering if rackless Ruth, Google's bean-counter-in-chief, is behind all these. At Bing, bean counters often had calculated that if you cut down index to half (after certain size), you reduce half of the cost but don't lose half of the revenues. So there is a sweet spot where you can maximize revenue if you are willing to let go few demanding customers. When quarterly results needs a little push, everything is a…

Did you really intend to call her "rackless Ruth" or was the slur an accidental misspelling of reckless? Because pointless and crude name-calling like that really detracts from any valid points you might have brought up.

It didn't detract anything for me. I'm able to read, comprehend, and digest any wisdom even if it's written with language which I wouldn't use myself. I think it's a really useful skill because you'll find most people do use different language to you.

Re: Google Memory Loss

#365

Post by tokenizerrr »

nkoren wrote: post #358
colordrops wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This same AI effect can be seen in the Android keyboard, where _properly_ spelled words will be replaced after typing another word or two because it's been determined to be more likely what you want. It's infuriating.

It actually does this with such consistency that I think it's a very specific mistake. For example, I frequently swipe "See you soon." It always, always renders as "See you son", which I then have to manually retype. Sometimes twice. I don't have a son, and I'm not a blind old cowboy who jocularly refers to any random person as "son". I honestly just want to type "soon", for the love of... anyhow, this is an ongoing,…

> I frequently swipe "See you soon." It always, always renders as "See you son"

This works fine for me with GBoard. Are you drawing a little circle on the o to indicate you want the double letter?

Re: Google Memory Loss

#366

Post by r3bl »

dingo_bat wrote: post #157

I've switched completely to bing for a few reasons: 1) Bing is much faster to load 2) Bing doesn't muck up the links. I can right click->copy and get the actual link. With google you get a long incantation that doesn't tell you what site it goes to. 3) Bing handles a few things better, eg, "$500 in ₹" works in bing but not in google. However, when I need local results, or results about something ongoing, Google is th…

When trying to convert currencies, try using three-letter codes for the currency. To take something a bit more obscure than dollars and rupees as an example, "500 PLN to RSD" (Polish zloty to Serbian dinar) will definitely work in every search engine.

As far as I understand it (I never actually looked it up to confirm), currency codes = two letter country codes + first letter of the noun from the currency name, so they're relatively easy to guess right.

Re: Google Memory Loss

#367

Post by duggan »

userbinator wrote: post #152
dannyw wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm glad I'm not alone in thinking this way. I wish I could use the Google of 10 years ago. Pre-personalization, pre-deep-learning RankBrain, just the reliable and consistent search engine where complex queries will return the result I want, if it is there. Today, if I'm searching for something unpopular or specific, I usually get frustrated. You would expect the opposite to happen as the size of the web should incre…

RankBrain Amusingly enough one of the definitions of "rank" is, according to Wiktionary, "having a very strong and bad taste or odor"... as in the smell of a decaying brain. How fitting. I almost wonder if it's deliberate. If they called it BrainRank (like PageRank), the adjectival meaning seems to be emphasised less.

The emphasis would be incorrect if the term were reversed - RankBrain is a Brain for Ranking like PageRank is a Rank for Pages.

No doubt there is someone in Google, however, who has a project for ranking AIs called BrainRank for their own amusement.

Anyway, your observation is also an amusing interpretation.

Re: Google Memory Loss

#368

Post by m12k »

cup-of-tea wrote: post #364
m12k wrote: post #324

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you really intend to call her "rackless Ruth" or was the slur an accidental misspelling of reckless? Because pointless and crude name-calling like that really detracts from any valid points you might have brought up.

It didn't detract anything for me. I'm able to read, comprehend, and digest any wisdom even if it's written with language which I wouldn't use myself. I think it's a really useful skill because you'll find most people do use different language to you.

My problem with the comment was not the dirty words (I love me some George Carlin and Louis Black), but the act of name-calling. The very first sentence of the hacker news guidelines for comments is "Be civil" [1].

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: Google Memory Loss

#369

Post by dreamcompiler »

nkoren wrote: post #358
colordrops wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This same AI effect can be seen in the Android keyboard, where _properly_ spelled words will be replaced after typing another word or two because it's been determined to be more likely what you want. It's infuriating.

It actually does this with such consistency that I think it's a very specific mistake. For example, I frequently swipe "See you soon." It always, always renders as "See you son", which I then have to manually retype. Sometimes twice. I don't have a son, and I'm not a blind old cowboy who jocularly refers to any random person as "son". I honestly just want to type "soon", for the love of... anyhow, this is an ongoing,…

There was a time when autocorrect on phones was moderately useful. That time has past. One of the first things I do with a new phone now is turn off autocorrect completely. It doesn't bother me to manually correct my own mistakes, but it bugs me a lot to have to correct the mistakes of the freaking robot that's supposed to be saving me time.

Re: Google Memory Loss

#370

Post by dx034 »

brain5ide wrote: post #357
dx034 wrote: post #321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think so. A few years ago, Google worked much better when you knew how to phrase queries. I often helped family members to find something online, just by rephrasing their original query. Today, it doesn't matter how you build your query, Google returns good results in any case. That also means that you can't search for specific info by phrasing queries differently but for the vast majority of people it makes…

You have a good point here. However, it would be great if both directions would be maintained. One, with "good enough" results for the common crowd, and another one, with a scalpel sharp ability to dissect it.

If you can do that at Google's scale I'm sure they'd be happy to hear your proposal. I really doubt Google's engineer wanted to give up the precision (they'll use it for their daily job as well), I just think they couldn't justify the additional resources.
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