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A search engine that favors text-heavy sites and punishes modern web design

search.marginalia.nu

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Re: A search engine that favors text-heavy sites and punishes modern web design

#111

Post by capableweb »

mumblemumble wrote: post #41

I like it. Coincidentally, the other day I was daydreaming about a search engine that favors sites that are updated less frequently. The thought being, the kinds of labors of love that characterized the 1990s Web that I still sometimes miss are still out there, it's just harder to find them amidst the flood of SEO dreck. So perhaps they could be made discoverable again with the help of a contrarian search engine that…

Similarly, I wish there was a recommendation engine (for web, music, movies, whatever) that can show you what is the furthest away from your existing tastes. I've learned to re-create my Spotify account once every 6 months or so, as their recommendation engine becomes a boring machine after using it daily for some months.

I'd love to discover new content that is different from what I read/watch/listen to now, but it's really hard to know about genres you don't know about.

Re: A search engine that favors text-heavy sites and punishes modern web design

#113

Post by foobarian »

b112 wrote: post #99
giancarlostoro wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure, but I remember when Google could find literally anything. Then they started adding a bunch of exceptions and crapped out their quality. I wonder how insanely different results would be to get the older Google Engine from the 2000s search result wise. I now have to play games with Google to find things. I feel like I do less than I used to for some reason.

The other day, I was searching for something, and google's suggested, on-site answers took up 1/2 the first page. All wrong. The actual search results were another 1/4 page of completely identical results, followed by google ad placed search results. I thought to myself, they've finally done it. Real responses are no longer first page. A lot of the cause for google getting crappy, is "ok google", another "all platfor…

I was just thinking that they finally became Lycos. It's what all the search engines except Google looked like back in the early 2000s - ad laden cesspools of irrelevant search results and other content. And it's why we all switched to Google at the time.

Re: A search engine that favors text-heavy sites and punishes modern web design

#114

Post by snakeboy »

Wow, that's awesome. Great work!

For a simple test, I searched "fall of the roman empire". In your search engine, I got wikipedia, followed by academic talks, chapters of books, and long-form blogs. All extremely useful resources.

When I search on google, I get wikipedia, followed by a listicle "8 Reasons Why Rome Fell", then the imdb page for a movie by the same name, and then two Amazon book links, which are totally useless.

Re: A search engine that favors text-heavy sites and punishes modern web design

#115

Post by 0xbadcafebee »

marginalia_nu wrote: post #61
asah wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Love it, kudos! This is great for developers and others who Just Need Answers and not shopping or entertainment. If you're looking for feedback, both from a UI design and utility standpoint, you might consider "inlining" results from selected sites, e.g. Wikipedia, stacked change, etc. Having worked on search for a long time, inlining (onebox etc) is a big reason users choose Google, and that channelers fail to get t…

If Google starts showing interesting text-heavy links instead of vapid listicles and storefronts, I have accomplished everything I ever could dream of.

Thank you for doing this important work.

Re: A search engine that favors text-heavy sites and punishes modern web design

#117

Post by MarioMan »

arnaudsm wrote: post #87

I wish we could configure Google's algorithm to our needs, and blacklist websites.

It could get tedious depending on how many sites you want to block, but you can add "-site:google.com" to exclude google.com, for instance.

Re: A search engine that favors text-heavy sites and punishes modern web design

#118

Post by schmorptron »

I've also found that brave search gets much better results than google for some programming related topic, simply by not being targeted by blogspam SEO as much. It's refreshing to not have to click through 3 auto generated "articles" but to either a) get the documentation straight away or b) find actually human written blog entries.

Re: A search engine that favors text-heavy sites and punishes modern web design

#120

Post by titzer »

I think I want a BBS. Text mode, fixed width font, keyboard-driven menus, no (or very little) bitmapped graphics. I've been thinking about the UIs for a lot of sites that I use to "do things" on the web. E.g. search for flights. Do I need any of that "beautiful" web design with pretty forms and fonts, bevelled edges, drop shadows, drop-down menus, hovers? Hell, do I even need a map? Heck no, I need three text entry fields and output a bulleted list, maybe table of results. Just give me the raw data and do as little presentation as possible, thanks.

I really think I want an internet console, not an animated magazine.

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