Can someone explain to me which of the five links in that image are ads so I can have the "aha, sneaky google" moment as well?
Every Google result now looks like an ad
641–650 of 1001 posts
Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad
#642Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well then don't use AMP? It's your domain, it's under your control. You at least have a choice here, whereas you can't block most other forms of URL obfuscation when being linked elsewhere.
Google is deprioritizing sites without amp in search to force them to use it. So, if I search for something on reddit, I already learned to use duck duck go. Cause then I don't have to edit url to get rid of amp part not scroll up and down for that link.
That's a super valid complaint and also completely orthogonal to any of this nonsense about the web being killed because a URL was obfuscated.
Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad
#643I really hate AMP. To the point where I started making an iOS browser that’s sole purpose was to bounce me from AMP links to the original link and delete the history step in between. I wish Apple would offer this in Safari - a simple ‘ignore AMP pages’ check box. AMP is google worst attempt yet at taking over the web. It’s so user hostile. It breaks lots of sites with its fake scroll and fake back button at the top o…
Are you suggesting that Google is evil?
Because you would be totally right. As a 8.5 year employee of Google I had to resign and blow the whistle.
I gathered all of the disclosure documents and stored them here:
--> https://www.zachvorhies.com It's worse than you can possibly imagine. Everyone else seems to be waking up to this just recently (last 6 months).
Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad
#644Earlier quoted context omitted.
No need to prepend. You can bang it at the end and retry your search if it doesn’t work with DDG.
Yea, but in my scenario I’m driving and need the right result right now. I’m not in any sense pro-google, so it pains me they are still the best at this. I can’t append or prepend, I had time for one search and need a result now before I miss a turn.
What the fuck are you doing typing on your phone whilst driving?!
Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad
#645Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad
#646A little while back I started experimenting with changing the user agent string and found that there are actually many different variations of Google’s search UI that are currently accessible. For example, I was surprised to find that by setting the user agent string to Netscape Navigator 4, I could get a lightweight, no-JS version of Google that looked like it was from the early 2000’s. By using a user agent string…
Many of these UIs don’t have the controversial changes that Google has recently been implementing, including adding favicons and hiding full URLs.
I used the UA workaround up until near the end of last year, when they broke it and instead replaced with an even more dumbed-down mobile UI. (If you know of a UA which can still "unlock" the old JS-less full-featured UI, please say so!)
Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad
#647I've been in this A/B test for a couple of months now, so I've had time to adjust, and I still hate it. I've just become so used to seeing the complete URL in green. The complete URL! If you hover over the results, you'll see that they like to take bits like numeric components or the query string out. This is part of Google's attempt to de-prioritise the URL. Their destructive AMP service confusingly shows you Google…
> This is part of Google's attempt to de-prioritise the URL. URLs have always been an implementation detail and not a user feature. From the very beginning it was intended that users would follow links, not type in URLs. HTML was built on hiding URLs behind text. Then AOL keywords happened. Then search explosion happened. And short URLs. And QR codes for real-world linking. And bookmarks because yet again typing in U…
You're talking about writing URLs as if that's the only purpose they serve. You also read URLs.
Same as I'm not going to type a long path to a file on my file browser or CLI, I'm not going to type the full, character-by-character URL. But being able to see the path also provides extremely useful information.
Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad
#648This was the endgame. Ever wonder why the original release of Chrome combined the search bar and the address bar?
Nobody bookmarks/memorizes domains or URLs anymore. Google == the web, as far as most people are concerned.
90% of the time I search for something, I end up on Wikipedia, StackExchange, or HTML versions of documentation/code repos like Github. So I started just searching Wikipedia etc. directly. Next step in taking back my sovereignty is to get in the habit of cloning git repos and ripgrepping the code/docs instead of relying on Github (another monopoly getting bigger every day).
(Advertising companies HATE him!)
Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad
#649Anyone here have a pro-Google stance? Because at this point I'm vehemently against the company and most of its products. There's no good replacement for Calendar or Docs/Sheets as of now, that I'm aware of. Microsoft's suite as mentioned by therealdrag0 is an obvious alternative, and perhaps less advertiser-oriented, but still not a great in-browser option IMO. Especially when considering the interoperability of the…
I have a pro-Google stance, but I usually wouldn't talk about it on HN because people just love to assume the worst about Google and anyone defending them just gets attacked. Personally, I think that Google's pushing websites to use HTTPS has done more to improve privacy than anything else I can think of in the last decade.
HTTPS is a great thing for privacy, but Google was just one of many doing that pushing! Personal attacks aside, I think it's plain now how evil the management culture there is. I have friends who work there, and they concur that the evilness flows down from the top. It's hard to defend that evilness, which I imagine is why you get so much grief.
Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad
#650So that is what is going on with my search results.
I hate it. It makes me feel dirty.