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Amazon has ruined search and Google is in on it

mdolon.com

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Re: Amazon has ruined search and Google is in on it

#41

Post by gostsamo »

SilkRoadie wrote: post #15

I would argue that google is being used incorrectly here. Google is specially being asked for a product list which meets a certain criteria. The user is asking Google to recommend the best bikes.. The user is actually looking for authoritative bicycle reviews to make a purchasing decision. Searching for “bicycle reviews” would give a far higher chance of finding what the user is after. They can then use the criteria…

Blame it on the user is always winning strategy, not? Google prides itself on its semantic search that can peak in the depths of your soul and understand your most hidden desires. I'd disagree and will say that asking for best bikes should give you a list of bikes that many people agree that they are good.

Re: Amazon has ruined search and Google is in on it

#42

Post by zo1 »

jpalomaki wrote: post #6
Traster wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think there is little incentive for anyone to curate a list of best bikes for under $500. There are plenty of incentives for journalism publications like MCN (motorcycle news) to do reviews of the products in the sectors they cover. There are plenty of publications about Cycling, it's a very popular sport. The problem is that the monetization of the affiliate system creates a massive incentive for people to c…

If people are not willing to pay for content and block ads, affiliate and content marketing schemes might be the future of these sites as well.

I think we may have stumbled upon an unfortunate circumstance of how our brains work, and it's being actively exploited (like say how we agree that marketing cigarettes to kids is bad kind of thing?). We could reasonably say that we are willing to pay for content, we're just not attuned to seeing how "free" content is actually detrimental to us and is being monetized behind the scenes.

At the same time, Google/Amazon latched on to it and are taking advantage of it for their own gains. Either way, we're stuck in a downward feedback loop that's only going to make this worse until one of the big players falls over.

Re: Amazon has ruined search and Google is in on it

#43

Post by IkmoIkmo »

scwoodal wrote: post #7

I add “site:reddit.com” to consumer/product related Google searches. This usually gets me the quality information I’m looking for.

Are there any nice Chrome extensions to expand on Google that anyone can recommend? Would be nice to have a default Reddit setting, or a 'search reddit' button on Google.

There's a couple other ones as well besides Reddit, particularly around key forums. Shouldn't be too hard to allow custom-buttons.

In general now that people are here, I'd be pretty interested to know what people's top 5 extensions are outside of the regular (uBlock, Pocket etc). They're quite powerful but I don't use that many actually.

In the EU I use a no-cookies extension, though imperfect. I also use 'video speed controller' religiously to easily watch/listen to content faster. But overal I find few extensions very useful and the ones I use cause issues on a small fraction of sites. Happy to hear from computer super-users what they use.

Re: Amazon has ruined search and Google is in on it

#44

Post by mrobins »

jsnell wrote: post #38

> I think the answer is because it’s not in their best interest to do so. They like that most consumers will look at these reviews, click through to Amazon and make their purchase with little hesitation. I don't understand the logic here. Why exactly would Google want people to thoughlessly click on Amazon affiliate links from other sites? There's no short-term beneft, since they don't get a cut. And there's no long-…

I think it’s less in Google’s long term best interest and more a marriage of convenience. Hopefully a temporary one.

Google increasingly wants users to find what they want on Google itself and not have to click through to the direct search results. Featured snippets are the strategy and these affiliate site listicles are crafted explicitly to be hoovered up as such by the algorithm.

One hope is that long term Google improves quality-content detection and deprioritizes the garbage.

Re: Amazon has ruined search and Google is in on it

#45

Post by [deleted] »

barrad0s wrote: post #29

There's also an even worse thing here. If you search for a product under shopping on google, something that is somewhat known like a certain TV model, and you'll see most SHOPPING results are from websites that actually don't sell anything, but rather will have a "product page" where either the buy button is disabled or redirects to amazon. They typically have much lower prices, or just low enough so you'll click.

[deleted]

Re: Amazon has ruined search and Google is in on it

#46

Post by noneeeed »

dageshi wrote: post #33
hdjjhhvvhga wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess many people do that, but it shows the review system failed miserably when you look for quality information on reddit. I mean, in theory, reddit would have all kinds of noise and fake opinions, whereas Amazon etc. should have only verified and curated reviews, including methodologies for spotting abuse and procedures for manual verification. Well, the economics of scale that drives them insane profits is also…

Reddit is always going to be better. Niche subs are where actual experts who've tried entire ranges of products hang out, amazon is where one random guy bought their first crappy product and left a 5 star review because they don't actually know whether what they bought is good or not.

Or even worse, leaving a 5 star review because it is what they ordered but they haven't actually used it because it's a present for their nephew...

Re: Amazon has ruined search and Google is in on it

#47

Post by nuker »

jsnell wrote: post #38

> I think the answer is because it’s not in their best interest to do so. They like that most consumers will look at these reviews, click through to Amazon and make their purchase with little hesitation. I don't understand the logic here. Why exactly would Google want people to thoughlessly click on Amazon affiliate links from other sites? There's no short-term beneft, since they don't get a cut. And there's no long-…

> There's no short-term beneft, since they don't get a cut.

But they do? IMHO some of the SEO techniques use direct payments to Google for keywords, results placement, etc.

Re: Amazon has ruined search and Google is in on it

#49

Post by flenserboy »

Google broke itself over a decade ago when they began giving you results either that their algorithms assumed you wanted or that they wanted you to have, period. Verbatim search hardly produces anything useful anymore, either. Search has been coopted, making the prime thing (past general connectivity) that made the internet so useful now all but worthless.

Re: Amazon has ruined search and Google is in on it

#50

Post by cat199 »

jsnell wrote: post #38

> I think the answer is because it’s not in their best interest to do so. They like that most consumers will look at these reviews, click through to Amazon and make their purchase with little hesitation. I don't understand the logic here. Why exactly would Google want people to thoughlessly click on Amazon affiliate links from other sites? There's no short-term beneft, since they don't get a cut. And there's no long-…

agree on that front -

but giving mediocre vs high quality results on the other hand forces you to use a particular search result page more and increases the likelyhood that you'll click through a paid search link in your frustration ...

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