Google's Results Are Infested, Open AI Is Using Their Playbook from the 2000s • Hacker News Board

Re: Google's Results Are Infested, Open AI Is Using Their Playbook from the 2000s

#121

Post by raincole » Sat, Dec 28, 2024, 6:20 PM UTC

chimpanzee wrote: post #85

echelon wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get very wrong and dangerous answers from AI frequently. I just searched "what's the ld50 of caffeine" and it says: > 367.7 mg/kg bw This is the ld50 of rats from this paper: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27461039/ This is higher than the ld50 estimated for humans: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caffeinism > The LD50 of caffeine in humans is dependent on individual sensitivity, but is estimated to be 150–200 milli…

For whatever it’s worth, in response to the same question posed by me (“what is the ld50 of caffeine”), Google’s AI properly reported it as 150-200 mg/kg. I asked this about 1 minute after you posted your comment. Perhaps it learned of and corrected its mistake in that short span of time, perhaps it reports differently on every occasion, or perhaps it thought you were a rat :)

Perhaps Google AI reads HN at work just like us.

Re: Google's Results Are Infested, Open AI Is Using Their Playbook from the 2000s

#122

Post by croes » Sat, Dec 28, 2024, 6:20 PM UTC

TiredOfLife wrote: post #101

m_ke wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would be great if it wasn't completely wrong 50% of the time.

Compared to 0% of relevant results in first 10 pages it's an enormous improvement.

Wait till the monetizing by ads starts

Re: Google's Results Are Infested, Open AI Is Using Their Playbook from the 2000s

#123

Post by aix1 » Sat, Dec 28, 2024, 6:20 PM UTC

TiredOfLife wrote: post #108

lubujackson wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which, we should note, didn't happen 10 years ago before the accountants took over search at Google. Those good, lean, helpful pages still exist. Google incentives websites to have pages of slop on everything now because they track how long you spend on a site as a "metric of a good match". Forrest for the trees...

Stack overflow launched 16 years ago, when for many years most of google results already were expertexchange type of sites with the obfuscated answers hidden pages deep in the link.

> expertexchange

This reminded me that, rather hilariously, it used to be called expertsexchange.com before adding a dash (experts-exchange.com).

Re: Google's Results Are Infested, Open AI Is Using Their Playbook from the 2000s

#124

Post by openrisk » Sat, Dec 28, 2024, 6:21 PM UTC

jeffbee wrote: post #49

m0llusk wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Time on task only matters for the lowest paid. At high levels robust, predictable, and other characteristics compete strongly for value. Do you want the most accurate medical diagnosis or the fastest?

Is that your typical search engine use case or are you more likely trying to find out when the taco stand opens?

There is no "typical" search engine use case. The fallacy that there is such a thing is a big part of the problem. The enshittification and decline of the digital window to the internet is so complete that even basic information management tools like browser bookmarks are deprecated: people will "search" even for sites they use repeatedly.

Minimally there needs to be a transparent split between commercial queries (searching to buy something) and knowledge / abstract queries (searching to learn something).

Users should be context aware (ideally using completely separate tools) of when they are simply accessing a pay-to-play online product catalog versus when they are querying what is effectively a decentralized wikipedia.

Commingling the commercial with the factual was always going to be a dead-end.

Re: Google's Results Are Infested, Open AI Is Using Their Playbook from the 2000s

#125

Post by pessimizer » Sat, Dec 28, 2024, 6:21 PM UTC

jeffbee wrote: post #49

m0llusk wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Time on task only matters for the lowest paid. At high levels robust, predictable, and other characteristics compete strongly for value. Do you want the most accurate medical diagnosis or the fastest?

Is that your typical search engine use case or are you more likely trying to find out when the taco stand opens?

So you want the answer to when the taco stand opens to be quick and wrong?

That's possibly the biggest waste of my time you could think of, because I'm probably going to have to spend a half-hour and a trip out of the house finding out that the answer was wrong. I'd rather get the answer in 5 minutes and for it to always be right. Dying in an accident coming back from a taco stand AI didn't know closed 6 months ago would be the worst death.

Re: Google's Results Are Infested, Open AI Is Using Their Playbook from the 2000s

#126

Post by croes » Sat, Dec 28, 2024, 6:21 PM UTC

warner25 wrote: post #43

binkHN wrote: post #7

> Enter 2024 with AI. The top 20% of search results are a wall of text from AI... I'll be the contrarian here and say I actually like Google's AI Overview? For the first time in a long time, I can search for an answer to a question and, instead of getting annoying ads and SEO-optimized uselessness, I actually get an answer. Google is finally useful again. That said, once Google screws with this and starts making sear…

But "search" and "getting an answer to a question" are two different things, aren't they? I realize that the trend has been going this way for a long time - probably since Ask Jeeves started blurring the line - and this is indeed how a lot of people try / want to use search engines, but still... I wish that Google (and competitors) would have separate pages for something like "Ask Google" vs. traditional search (wher…

It want stay long. You are now in the pre ad phase. As soon as the ads are integrated the answers will become worse.

Re: Google's Results Are Infested, Open AI Is Using Their Playbook from the 2000s

#127

Post by christophilus » Sat, Dec 28, 2024, 6:21 PM UTC

binkHN wrote: post #7

> Enter 2024 with AI. The top 20% of search results are a wall of text from AI... I'll be the contrarian here and say I actually like Google's AI Overview? For the first time in a long time, I can search for an answer to a question and, instead of getting annoying ads and SEO-optimized uselessness, I actually get an answer. Google is finally useful again. That said, once Google screws with this and starts making sear…

Same with Brave search. The AI answer is often good enough for me to not need to go further. I’m with you, except I don’t use Google.

Re: Google's Results Are Infested, Open AI Is Using Their Playbook from the 2000s

#128

Post by bediger4000 » Sat, Dec 28, 2024, 6:22 PM UTC

scarface_74 wrote: post #71

wwweston wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Libraries and librarians are starting to seem very relevant again. As are journalistic institutions.

Unfortunately, many of the “journalistic” institutions are owned by large corporations who aren’t going to “speak truth to power” in fear of retribution. We just saw this with ABC News’s settlement with Trump because its owner Disney wanted to stay in his good graces. We also saw this with Bezos owner Washington Post

You forgot LA Times oligarch, Patrick Soon-Shiong.

Re: Google's Results Are Infested, Open AI Is Using Their Playbook from the 2000s

#129

Post by vidarh » Sat, Dec 28, 2024, 6:22 PM UTC

echelon wrote: post #70

warner25 wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But "search" and "getting an answer to a question" are two different things, aren't they? I realize that the trend has been going this way for a long time - probably since Ask Jeeves started blurring the line - and this is indeed how a lot of people try / want to use search engines, but still... I wish that Google (and competitors) would have separate pages for something like "Ask Google" vs. traditional search (wher…

I get very wrong and dangerous answers from AI frequently. I just searched "what's the ld50 of caffeine" and it says: > 367.7 mg/kg bw This is the ld50 of rats from this paper: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27461039/ This is higher than the ld50 estimated for humans: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caffeinism > The LD50 of caffeine in humans is dependent on individual sensitivity, but is estimated to be 150–200 milli…

I get your point wasn't this specific example, it's perhaps not a very good example of being dangerous: Getting that much caffeine into your bloodstream takes quite a commitment, and someone who knows the term LD50 is perhaps not very likely to think it indicates what is safe to consume. It's also not something you're likely to do accidentally because you've looked it up online and decided to test it.

In the most concentrated form in typical commercial caffeine tablets, it's half to one fistful. In high-caffeine pre-workout supplements, it's still a quantity that you'd find almost impossible to get down and keep down... E.g. a large tumbler full of powder of mine with just enough water to make it a thick slurry you'd likely vomit up long before much would make it into your bloodstream...

I'm not saying it's impossible to overdose on caffeinated drinks, because some do, and you can run into health problems before that, but I don't think that error is likely to be very high on the list of dangerous advice.

Re: Google's Results Are Infested, Open AI Is Using Their Playbook from the 2000s

#130

Post by joe_the_user » Sat, Dec 28, 2024, 6:22 PM UTC

wwweston wrote: post #18

m_ke wrote: post #8

SEO ruined the web, guided by Google's ranking algorithm. Things will get even worse as scammy companies start flooding the web with LLM generated content pushing their products to bias LLMs to increase the probability of outputing their name for keywords related to their business.

Libraries and librarians are starting to seem very relevant again. As are journalistic institutions.

Libraries are booming but as gathering spots and place for people to get wifi to ... consume the web. Books remain but the selection is quite sparse.

And journalism has been gutted, more gutted than is obvious. Especially, with mainstream journalists having few "feet on the ground" a lot can sneak by (what happened in East Palestine, for example, can be found on Youtube's Status Coup new but not the mainstream).