Google algorithm change launched • Hacker News Board

Re: Google algorithm change launched

#141

Post by moultano » Fri, Jan 28, 2011, 9:51 PM UTC

seles wrote: post #135

LiveTheDream wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How would an algorithm detect viewer satisfaction?

How long user stays on page (hint would be how soon they make next search/click), whether or not they continue looking for something under a similar search query, having actual buttons users can click to rate, etc.

Spam gets upvoted to the top of reddit on a regular basis. Most people are pretty apathetic to legitimacy most of the time. All we ever have is proxies for quality, the hope is that we have enough of them to cover the space.

Re: Google algorithm change launched

#142

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Jan 28, 2011, 9:54 PM UTC

[deleted]

Re: Google algorithm change launched

#143

Post by gbesen » Fri, Jan 28, 2011, 9:57 PM UTC

Hi Matt, I would like to ask if vertical search engines like vast.com is considered as a scraper site? Real estate search, used car search and other vertical search concepts do need traffic from google. I for one find it valuable to visit a vertical search engine that saves me from visiting site after site to find the car / house I want. Does this mean the end of vertical search engines? (I'm not affiliated with vast.com in any way)

I'm sure many people would like to know about this, thank you.

Re: Google algorithm change launched

#144

Post by Galaxis » Fri, Jan 28, 2011, 10:02 PM UTC

My current favourite spammy search (Windows process names) seems slightly improved, but still produces mostly unusable results.

Try something like: http://www.google.com/search?q=hidfind.exe

Another similar search area (Windows drivers for various hardware) has improved a lot judging from the few examples I just tried - actual hardware manufacturers are now amongst the top results for a change.

So that's quite a step forward...

Re: Google algorithm change launched

#145

Post by tejaswiy » Fri, Jan 28, 2011, 10:04 PM UTC

seanalltogether wrote: post #23

Matt, I just went through my search history because i remembered a very specific instance of seeing this. Here's the query. http://www.google.com/search?q=nstoolbar+bottom+bar&ie=u... You'll notice that efreedom.com shows on the first page with content taken directly from stackoverflow. While stackoverflow does show in the results, the exact page that efreedom copies does not. Anyway, I'm glad you guys are taking thi…

So HN is in the first spot for this query now. And it redirects to this question. Make of that what you will.

Re: Google algorithm change launched

#146

Post by quag » Fri, Jan 28, 2011, 10:14 PM UTC

Galaxis wrote: post #144

My current favourite spammy search (Windows process names) seems slightly improved, but still produces mostly unusable results. Try something like: http://www.google.com/search?q=hidfind.exe Another similar search area (Windows drivers for various hardware) has improved a lot judging from the few examples I just tried - actual hardware manufacturers are now amongst the top results for a change. So that's quite a step…

Repeating a quick search I was doing a week or so ago to find drivers, I'm not seeing an improvement. Asus actually has a great driver site, that is way better and less hassle than the spam sites, but I've yet to see it show up in search results. I only found it because one of the spam sites was using asus's servers to serve up the drivers.

http://www.google.co.nz/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&...

Re: Google algorithm change launched

#147

Post by kqueue » Fri, Jan 28, 2011, 10:30 PM UTC

The fact that efreedom results are showing up in the results is irritating by itself. We all know efreedom is spam, and so does Google.

Now I am always on alert when clicking on a link in the results to avoid the spam pages like efreedom, expertexchange and whatnot. Why not just remove them from search results?

They are causing enough bad publicity to Google.

Re: Google algorithm change launched

#148

Post by brianpan » Fri, Jan 28, 2011, 10:46 PM UTC

kunjaan wrote: post #103

I googled for my own name "Kunjan Kshetri" and I still see sites like 1. www.peekyou.com/_kshetri 2. www.yasni.com/kunjan+kshetri/check+people 3. mobile.aa.com/mt/net35.ccs.neu.edu/home/kunjan/?un_jtt in the front page. These sites reused my homepage or just have my name listed. They too add no original content. Please remove these sites. Please note that searching in Bing produces more original content results.

Google doesn't just remove sites from their index. They will always be there. But if you think a different site should rank higher than these spammy ones, you should mention it and maybe someone can look at it. (I don't work for Google.)

Re: Google algorithm change launched

#149

Post by forgotAgain » Fri, Jan 28, 2011, 10:49 PM UTC

When I search for "rabbitmq exchange declare" (no quotes) I noticed the following.

Mailing list entries from http://lists.rabbitmq.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/rabbitmq-... show up from old.nabble.com before the original source.

From a quick look there is significant improvement.

Re: Google algorithm change launched

#150

Post by dcdan » Fri, Jan 28, 2011, 11:07 PM UTC

Matt_Cutts wrote: post #133

dcdan wrote: post #81

At what point does Google cross over from "ranked by algorithm" to "ranked by algorithm selection as editorialized by Googlers and bloggers?" Publicly discussing algorithms changes like this seems like a potential PR problem.

The whole history of Google is trying to find algorithms that encode our philosophy and mental model of what we think users want. We've been discussing algorithmic changes with people online since 2001, when GoogleGuy would show up on webmasterworld.com to dispel misconceptions.

This algorithm change could come across as more editorial and less empirical. It's publicized as highly targeted ("slightly over 2% of queries"), responding to small tech discussion (Atwood, SO, HN, quality launch meeting), and seemingly rolled out in a short period of time. The media could easily boil this down to "a small number people felt sites they liked were under-ranked, so Google moved them up a week later."

I mention this because Google often talks publicly about being entirely algorithmic, and elements of this narrative feel human.