Every Google result now looks like an ad • Hacker News Board

Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad

#211

Post by bduerst » Tue, Jan 21, 2020, 6:56 PM UTC

ping_pong wrote: post #186

cytzol wrote: post #26

I've been in this A/B test for a couple of months now, so I've had time to adjust, and I still hate it. I've just become so used to seeing the complete URL in green. The complete URL! If you hover over the results, you'll see that they like to take bits like numeric components or the query string out. This is part of Google's attempt to de-prioritise the URL. Their destructive AMP service confusingly shows you Google…

How is hijacking the domain with Google for AMP not anti-competitive? I'm surprised a class action lawsuit hasn't erupted because of that.

It is not a requirement for AMP. CDNs now let you roll your own domains on the AMP standard: https://blog.cloudflare.com/announcing-amp-real-url/

Bing also uses the AMP standard: https://blogs.bing.com/Webmaster-Blog/September-2018/Introdu...

Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad

#212

Post by lykr0n » Tue, Jan 21, 2020, 6:57 PM UTC

enterabdazer wrote: post #72

lykr0n wrote: post #3

I wish there was a way to directly help Bing/DuckDuckGo/Yandex improve their search results. I've tried both, and it's just not the same. Google I can bang in cryptic queries like > centos 7 tuned no daemon and get the 3rd link about how to run tuned in a no daemon mode. Bing/DuckDuckGo have the article at around 7th or 8th place, but prefaced by a lot of "while technically not wrong, not what I'm looking for" links.…

I felt the same about Google alternatives up until about 3 months ago. Google's results have been declining in quality for a decade, with much more rapid decline over the past year or three. Google's results are uglier and blatantly revenue based. They have now lapsed behind DuckDuckGo in usefulness for me. I fall back to Google a few times per week, with inconsistent results when I need a "second opinion." I'd sugge…

Done. Let's see how it works out.

Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad

#213

Post by dana321 » Tue, Jan 21, 2020, 6:58 PM UTC

itamarst wrote: post #2

Perhaps it's worth quoting Larry Page and Sergey Brin, in the original paper on the Google search engine: > "The goals of the advertising business model do not always correspond to providing quality search to users. ...we expect that advertising funded search engines will be inherently biased towards the advertisers and away from the needs of the consumers. " ( http://infolab.stanford.edu/~backrub/google.html ) At th…

backrub.. still cracks me up when i see it.

Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad

#214

Post by dana321 » Tue, Jan 21, 2020, 6:59 PM UTC

Why don't they put the icon and url underneath the title? Seems like its around the wrong way!

Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad

#215

Post by bduerst » Tue, Jan 21, 2020, 7:00 PM UTC

solarkraft wrote: post #177

pb7 wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

DuckDuckGo is mostly Bing.

They have a bunch of own infrastructure and data these days (I have read they don't use Bing at all now). Besides: It's cleaner, faster, has often useful instant answers (random, 10011001 in hex, 1 btc in xmr, 40 stones in kg), bangs (!g for Google, !gh for GitHub, !yt for YouTube, !w for Wikipedia) and actually respects your privacy. I think this feature could be much improved an expanded, but the location context s…

>and actually respects your privacy.

According to who?

DDG is a privately-owned, for-profit corporation, whose code is closed source and doesn't undergo independent audits or validations of privacy.

Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad

#216

Post by djsumdog » Tue, Jan 21, 2020, 7:02 PM UTC

verroq wrote: post #93

jaywalk wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They absolutely did not. But even if that were true, how does that excuse this awful behavior?

Well clearly they built it so they own it. So if you don’t like it, it’s their way or the highway!

I'm pretty sure you're an obvious troll, but it is 2020 so it's getting harder to tell these days.

Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad

#217

Post by Nextgrid » Tue, Jan 21, 2020, 7:05 PM UTC

bduerst wrote: post #215

solarkraft wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They have a bunch of own infrastructure and data these days (I have read they don't use Bing at all now). Besides: It's cleaner, faster, has often useful instant answers (random, 10011001 in hex, 1 btc in xmr, 40 stones in kg), bangs (!g for Google, !gh for GitHub, !yt for YouTube, !w for Wikipedia) and actually respects your privacy. I think this feature could be much improved an expanded, but the location context s…

>and actually respects your privacy. According to who? DDG is a privately-owned, for-profit corporation, whose code is closed source and doesn't undergo independent audits or validations of privacy.

Their only selling point is privacy, so I feel like they have an incentive to keep their only lifeline going. If they break their promise it’s essentially the end of their business as they don’t have anything else compelling.

Most other companies can get away with violating your privacy because they have something nobody else has (either because their product is so good or because of network effects) so you have no choice but to keep using them. DDG doesn’t have that luxury.

Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad

#218

Post by Nextgrid » Tue, Jan 21, 2020, 7:06 PM UTC

ZWoz wrote: post #178

scumbert wrote: post #117

Unironically switch to Bing

Funny, that google UI change finally pushed me to set DuckDuckGo to default search provider in my work computer. Few times I have been little bit dissapointed with search results and did another search in google, but mostly ddg is pretty smooth experience. So, thanks google for that UI change.

Personally I learn from DDG’s failures and am able to predict whether DDG is going to be good enough or if I need to add the “!g” shortcut so it automatically redirects me to Google, saving a few seconds in the process.

Hopefully one day DDG becomes good enough that I never have to do that, though with the recent developments it’s more likely that Google will become worse enough to make current DDG be good in comparison as opposed to DDG actually becoming better than Google. Sad times for sure.

Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad

#219

Post by jrullman » Tue, Jan 21, 2020, 7:07 PM UTC

woodrowbarlow wrote: post #111

ryanmercer wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I noticed this on a co-workers screen recently and my immediate thought was "what dodgy search extensions have they been installing?". My legit first reaction when I saw it last week on my daily driver was "I wonder what extension is trying to cash out".

(tangent) i really hate what browser extensions have become.

They’re returning to their roots — 3rd party toolbars.

Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad

#220

Post by mattnewton » Tue, Jan 21, 2020, 7:07 PM UTC

mam2 wrote: post #54

They also kinda build the web though

Googler here, but my opinions are my own.

I think this is backwards, like saying that a road paving company built cars. The need exists because the Web took off and became huge, and maybe Google can take credit for helping it scale, but Google was only successful because other people were creating content people wanted to find at a massive rate. If the web was tiny we could use hand curated indices. If Google was never founded, and the web got bigger, one of the other dozens of search companies would have helped the web scale instead.