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Google backtracks on search results design

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Re: Google backtracks on search results design

#211
post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s editable for me on iOS. I would probably stop using it if they removed the ability to manually edit the address bar.

same. must be an android thing.

It is editable for me.

Latest Chrome mobile running on Android 9.

Re: Google backtracks on search results design

#212
This has been trending now a few days, but I still don’t get it. Seems nobody can really say what exactly about this design says ‘advertisement’?

I get the feeling Mr. Mod’s tweet caught fire because of the sentiment, of Google oppression and dominance, and not many stopped to think what in particular about the design they don’t like.

Personally there is nothing immediately offensive to the way the results look. In fact I might argue it’s actually a good esthetic. I like seeing the favicon @ the top, and it does mimic the way mobile search results have looked for a while now. Nobody freaked out about that change?

If the anger over this is because people think this is a dark pattern, trying to obfuscate the difference between advertisements, that might not necessarily be wrong. But progression has been happening for a long time now. The picture in the article shows that at least since 2013, they eliminated the different color background that used to highlight ads. So it’s been a good 7 years since ads were nearly indistinguishable from regular results.

Re: Google backtracks on search results design

#213
post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nothing like this is going to happen. Google Search is leaps and bounds ahead beyond anything else. And Google Assistant on top of this makes it even more effective. This was a mistake by Google and they heard the feedback and corrected it. MySpace analogy doesn't make sense since there is no Facebook, which was a competent social network, here. Search is a massive investment and you don't just have random companies…

> Google Search is leaps and bounds ahead beyond anything else. Nothing is too big to fail. If there's no direct competitor, an indirect one or a group could take over too. > Duckduckgo itself uses Bing Search as its backend. This reads to me as if Bing was the only backend they use, which isn't the case. According to Wikipedia they use multiple backends: "DuckDuckGo's results are a compilation of "over 400" sources,…

Whenever I hear people complain about Google and that they'll switch to a competitor, I'm reminded of the "Delete Facebook" memes that happened, only to have FB reach a new user record every subsequent month.

Don't be deluded by the HN bubble. I like DDG and am glad it exists, but it's usage in a year is probably what Google gets in a few minutes, and I'm willing to bet that ratio hasn't really improved significantly for years.

Re: Google backtracks on search results design

#214

This may be a major event in Google's history - the point where they overdid ads and started to be perceived as a inferior service. This is sometimes called "pulling a Myspace". Myspace was once the top social network. They looked unchallengeable. Then they got greedy. Myspace kept upping their ad content until usage dropped. Instead of backing off the ads, they upped the ad content even more to maintain revenue. Usa…

Nothing like this is going to happen. Google Search is leaps and bounds ahead beyond anything else. And Google Assistant on top of this makes it even more effective. This was a mistake by Google and they heard the feedback and corrected it. MySpace analogy doesn't make sense since there is no Facebook, which was a competent social network, here. Search is a massive investment and you don't just have random companies…

I’ve been noticing recently that a lot of non-technical people have been complaining about how Google doesn’t work as well as it used to.

Re: Google backtracks on search results design

#215
The new look is annoying, but in my case I'm running a PiHole server. Clicking on ads just presents me with a page not found error.

I guess if I really get tired of the new look, there's other options out there. DuckDuckGo is great and I use them occasionally. Bing actually isn't terrible either, so there's alternatives out there. Maybe I'll give some others a try for a while.

Re: Google backtracks on search results design

#216
post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I remember that, and I am a still a tiny bit salty about how it impacted me as a user. Ever since, it has been so unnecessarily tedious get the raw image link from Google. Half the time, I end up with a data url, sometimes I get taken to the backing website, who usually don't know anything about accessibility, sometimes I get the image. It's all just so much worse now. That said, it is absolutely theft for Google to…

> That said, it is absolutely theft for Google to source data from your site, then use that to add value to their site, without giving you any click-through traffic. Would you be OK, if Google didn't show images from your site on their site? If so, I believe a simple robots.txt statement should be sufficient. > This would mean that you would get paid to have good SEO, or to be a central hub. The websites that compris…

> I don't really get the logic by which someone letting people find you, should pay for that privilege. Images ends up being more of a media platform than search engine. I'm rarely looking for a site. Doesn't seem too weird that they could pay for some of the content

Re: Google backtracks on search results design

#217

Duckduckgo shows favicons in search results as well but nobody complains about it. People should be focusing on how to make Google ads stand out more and not the use of favicons.

Check the settings panel. You can configure everything, including the favicons.

I like the favicons feature. I meant that favicons themselves aren't what people should be complaining about.

Re: Google backtracks on search results design

#218

This may be a major event in Google's history - the point where they overdid ads and started to be perceived as a inferior service. This is sometimes called "pulling a Myspace". Myspace was once the top social network. They looked unchallengeable. Then they got greedy. Myspace kept upping their ad content until usage dropped. Instead of backing off the ads, they upped the ad content even more to maintain revenue. Usa…

As an Adsense publisher, I noticed they enabled ‘Auto ads’ on every website, automatically. What this does is it plasters 15 ads in a long web page, it adds interstitials to mobile page and it just fucking ruins your websites UX. It’s enabled on millions of websites now. It’s like Google is desperate to make more money. I can disable it, for now. I won’t be surprised if at some point in the future, they make it the s…

“It’s like Google is desperate to make more money.”

It’s getting exponentially harder to achieve their expected growth rates. They haven’t managed to find another significant revenue source beside ads so they have to squeeze everything out of that. Kind of sad that all the super smart people there still haven’t come up with any product they can sell with enough revenue besides ads.

Re: Google backtracks on search results design

#219
post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Google Search is leaps and bounds ahead beyond anything else. Nothing is too big to fail. If there's no direct competitor, an indirect one or a group could take over too. > Duckduckgo itself uses Bing Search as its backend. This reads to me as if Bing was the only backend they use, which isn't the case. According to Wikipedia they use multiple backends: "DuckDuckGo's results are a compilation of "over 400" sources,…

Whenever I hear people complain about Google and that they'll switch to a competitor, I'm reminded of the "Delete Facebook" memes that happened, only to have FB reach a new user record every subsequent month. Don't be deluded by the HN bubble. I like DDG and am glad it exists, but it's usage in a year is probably what Google gets in a few minutes, and I'm willing to bet that ratio hasn't really improved significantly…

For anyone actually curious about the numbers:

Google traffic is about 4 million searches per minute, which comes to 6 billion searches per day. DDG traffic is about 50 million searches per day, so about 1%.

It looks like DDG traffic has been doubling every 1.5-2 years or so for the past decade. I presume that Google's traffic is relatively constant at this point.

https://duckduckgo.com/traffic

Re: Google backtracks on search results design

#220

It's too late, lasting damage has been done. This redesign made me seriously look at DDG and I'm impressed with what I found.

I switched out to DDG as well today. See how it goes. Any takers for trying out Bing?

I used Bing maps once, because, guess, Google thought they know better than me what I want.

Namely, I was planning a summer trip that included a mountain road that is closed 9 months per year due to snow. And I was doing that in spring.

Google didn't let me use that road because, right, it was closed. And people shouldn't be allowed to plan their trips 3 months in advance.

Bing gave me the same results without the nonsense.

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