About DRMing the web, related HN discussion from 2 days ago about web environment integrity: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36778999
Become Ungoogleable
91–100 of 212 posts
Re: Become Ungoogleable
#92Earlier quoted context omitted.
Okay, but now try "what's the best gaming laptop?" or something similar. This is the sort of query that, at one time, would unearth some nerd's web site alongside PCWorld or whatever. Now it's seven pages of nearly identical listicles, some of which are on bizarre domains like "DougsAutoBodyAndFlowerShop.com", and all of which are festooned with ads, also provided by Google.
Ok, I'll try that. Top results (excluding sponsors b/c UBlock Origin): PC Gamer The Verge Games Radar Youtube (channel: Jarrod's Tech) A giant ad showing some laptops to buy Youtube (channel: PC Builder) RTINGS.com PC Magazine Youtube (channel: Top Tech Now) CNET Tom's Hardware Another giant ad showing some laptops to buy Engadget PC Magazine Laptop Mag TechRadar These are mainstream tech press sites. And maybe the r…
>mainstream tech press sites
That's kind of the point. Old Google unearthed things. New Google is where you go to find out what the media (and Google) wants you to know.
If that's what you want, then sure, Google is great.
I used "best gaming laptop" as an example, but you can try "what is the best mayonnaise" if you'd like. My results included Uproxx. Which I guess counts as "unearthing," since I would never go to a clickbait farm like Uproxx for culinary tips.
I'm not suggesting I have an alternative, before you ask. This may be nothing more than the inevitable result of the commercialization and commodification of the Internet. Since all of the search companies are going all-in on AI stuff, you may find yourself in my position in a year or two.
Re: Become Ungoogleable
#93what about the robots meta tags[1], e.g., noindex, nofollow, noarchive?
1: https://developers.google.com/search/docs/crawling-indexing/...
Re: Become Ungoogleable
#94It's a fine idea. But what I'm taking away from this post is the link to the Google/Chromium web DRM prototype and summary ... yikes. https://raw.githubusercontent.com/RupertBenWiser/Web-Environ... >- The web page executing in a user's web browser >- A third party that can “attest” to the device a web browser is executing on, referred to as the attester >- The web developers server which can remotely verify attestati…
I've been telling people for years that android's safetynet attestation would eventually arrive on PC, seems like it's finally happening.
Re: Become Ungoogleable
#95Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ok, I'll try that. Top results (excluding sponsors b/c UBlock Origin): PC Gamer The Verge Games Radar Youtube (channel: Jarrod's Tech) A giant ad showing some laptops to buy Youtube (channel: PC Builder) RTINGS.com PC Magazine Youtube (channel: Top Tech Now) CNET Tom's Hardware Another giant ad showing some laptops to buy Engadget PC Magazine Laptop Mag TechRadar These are mainstream tech press sites. And maybe the r…
I want to point out - if you get to the seventh page of Google, it's been known for some time that those results are... specious at best. Check out this xkcd from almost a decade ago: https://xkcd.com/1334/ https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/1334:_Second If you're really going to page 7 of Google... man, that's a desperation I've never known.
I've searched for various weird error messages and ended up far into the Lands of Deep Pagination before, trying to find some glimmer of hope that I can unbrick whatever beep-boop thing I broke.
It is a violent and windswept place, barren of joy or peace.
Re: Become Ungoogleable
#96It's a fine idea. But what I'm taking away from this post is the link to the Google/Chromium web DRM prototype and summary ... yikes. https://raw.githubusercontent.com/RupertBenWiser/Web-Environ... >- The web page executing in a user's web browser >- A third party that can “attest” to the device a web browser is executing on, referred to as the attester >- The web developers server which can remotely verify attestati…
Ooh, this is epic, the ultimate antiadblocker is here.
Re: Become Ungoogleable
#97what about the robots meta tags[1], e.g., noindex, nofollow, noarchive? 1: https://developers.google.com/search/docs/crawling-indexing/...
This is actually the correct way. Robots.txt only stops google from crawling your website, but it might still appear in the index. If you search for the site, then it is shown in the search results, but without any of the content of the page.
If you want to prevent indexing as well, you'll have to do this.
Also explained here: https://developers.google.com/search/docs/crawling-indexing/...
Re: Become Ungoogleable
#98It's a fine idea. But what I'm taking away from this post is the link to the Google/Chromium web DRM prototype and summary ... yikes. https://raw.githubusercontent.com/RupertBenWiser/Web-Environ... >- The web page executing in a user's web browser >- A third party that can “attest” to the device a web browser is executing on, referred to as the attester >- The web developers server which can remotely verify attestati…
The weirdest thing is that GOOGLE of all companies now wants to make an obviously anti-scraping technology. Oh well, the world we live in
Isn't it a feature? Now search engines will skip drm sites.
Re: Become Ungoogleable
#99Every google search I perform these days is pretty disappointing.
I know I’m not going to get results from smaller pages when I search google. It makes me think I might as well make a list of 20 popular websites and just search all of those and collate the results
Re: Become Ungoogleable
#100Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ok, I'll try that. Top results (excluding sponsors b/c UBlock Origin): PC Gamer The Verge Games Radar Youtube (channel: Jarrod's Tech) A giant ad showing some laptops to buy Youtube (channel: PC Builder) RTINGS.com PC Magazine Youtube (channel: Top Tech Now) CNET Tom's Hardware Another giant ad showing some laptops to buy Engadget PC Magazine Laptop Mag TechRadar These are mainstream tech press sites. And maybe the r…
>mainstream tech press sites That's kind of the point. Old Google unearthed things. New Google is where you go to find out what the media (and Google) wants you to know. If that's what you want, then sure, Google is great. I used "best gaming laptop" as an example, but you can try "what is the best mayonnaise" if you'd like. My results included Uproxx. Which I guess counts as "unearthing," since I would never go to a…
Yeah - I think that "commercialization and commodification" is kind of what I've attributed this to. I think the webring concept is probably the best way to get away from this, but it's not trivial to find those hidden gems. The good ones become/became less hidden. The bad ones get/got buried.
But if these are the complaints about Google - "I only see sites that are so good that they constitute the mainstream" - I'm... ok with that? That seems like a good outcome to me. I don't mind using that tool.
From what I understand of your complaint, sometime in the last 20 years, the Google stopped finding outsider art. I would guess that's due to SEO. And with anything that's known to drive revenue to a business, that sort of thing becomes a target. So people target the Google algorithm to place better. I don't know that there's a solution to that. But I don't think it's because of a change inside Google - more like a change in society.