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

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

#211

Post by jerf »

Don't bet on AI staying clean.

A lot of HN readers conceptualize the forces attacking the integrity of the search results as just some isolated people taking occasional potshots, and then maybe slinking away if their trick gets blocked.

It is probably a lot more accurate to visualize the SEO industry as a Dark Google. Roughly as well resourced, with many smart people working on it full time, day in, day out, with information sharing and coordination. It isn't literally one company, but this conception is probably a lot closer then the one in the heads of most people reading this. Dark Google is motivated, resourced, and smart.

And then, once I started thinking of it that way for this post, I realized that increasingly.... Google is increasingly at beck and call of Dark Google. They're increasingly the real customers of Google and the real source of money. It's why Google just seems to be getting worse and worse for us... it's because we're not the real customers any more. Dark Google rules.

And if Dark Google has not yet figured out how to scam AI... it is only a matter of time. Dark Google is where Google gets its money now. When Dark Google turns its attention to AI fully, OpenAI will be no more able to resist its economic incentives than Google did.

Can't wait for the first screenshot of someone searching for the impact of the battle of Gettysburg on the civil war and seeing the AI do its subtle best to slide an add for Coca Cola into it in some semantically bizarre manner.

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

#212

Post by rlpb »

Infestation also applies to actual "organic" results. The old Google philosophy would have ranked pages with annoying pop-ups, paywalls, sign-in walls etc out of existence. Today's Google does not. They even tolerate sites that show them articles to index but are then hidden from the general public behind a paywall.

The old Internet still exists, but Google's ranking behaviour hides it.

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

#213

Post by sobellian »

griomnib wrote: post #200
croes wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

They have something Google never had: a paid tier. There are plenty of revenue models aside from ads.

The excluded middle here is a paid tier that nevertheless serves you ads :(

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

#214

Post by xboxnolifes »

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…

I sometimes like it, but I've gotten very skeptical of it. One day a friend and I searched the exact same question in Google and got opposing answers for the identical search string. Thus wasn't in the "AI" widget, but one of their usual widgets that give answers to questions. I assume both use some form of AI anyway.

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

#215

Post by hombre_fatal »

Deegy wrote: post #29
zknowledge wrote: post #13

Definitely agree, but I'm surprised Perplexity wasn't mentioned in this post. It's currently Perplexity Vs. Google

Once chatGPT and Claude (through MCP) added web search functionality I completely dropped Perplexity. I assume I'm not unique in this regard. Feels like the writing is on the wall for Perplexity.

Yeah, I keep using the $1/mo promotions for Perplexity but I only really use it because it can read the results to me which I use for practicing foreign languages, so there's that.

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

#216

Post by Schnitz »

pishpash wrote: post #140
Schnitz wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The AI answers are nowhere near good enough to always be at the top, without any clear indication that they are just a rough guess. Especially for critical things like visa requirements or medical information. When you search Google for these sort of things, you want the link to the authoritative source, not a best guess. It’s very different for queries like say “movies like blade runner”.

It seems damning enough that Google itself doesn't know what is a more authoritative source or they would have weighted their AI output appropriately. What does that say about their traditional search results?

I doubt that was the decision process. It’s much more likely that there is a directive coming down from the top that “we need to go all in on AI”, which then gets amplified down by middle management and the result is AI smeared over all results irregardless if helpful. That then drives up some vanity metric like “searches answered by AI summaries”, while metrics like “bad AI summaries shown” don’t get attention. As a result the organization is happy, people can get promoted, etc.

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

#217

Post by nmeagent »

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…

Yes, Google's AI chatbot confidently claimed yesterday that US passports have a fingerprinting requirement, which is absolutely not true. These things can't be trusted to emit even basic facts without somehow screwing it up and it's frankly depressing how they are worming their way into almost everything. I hope this particular hype train is derailed as soon as possible.

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

#218

Post by nuancebydefault »

beejiu wrote: post #117
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…

Perhaps a more common question: "How many calories do men need to lose weight?" Google AI responded: "To lose weight, men typically need to reduce their daily calorie intake by 1,500 - 1,800 calories" Which is obviously dangerous advice. IMO Google AI overviews should not show up for anything (a) medical or (b) numerical. LLMs just aren't safe enough yet.

If your calorie intake is just 1500 today, it is bad advice. If your calorie surplus is 1800, it is good advice.

But I wonder, were those few words the full response? Information hiding to prove a point is too easy.

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

#219

Post by giraffe_lady »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #132
giraffe_lady wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What a relief then that those are all healthy, well-supported organizations with bright futures. It's not a coincidence that the solution to this problem is exactly the organizations that are being systematically undermined and dismantled.

They aren't being undermined and dismantled, they're dying of the same cancer search is, and one they contracted voluntarily: advertising .

Libraries are?

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

#220

Post by griomnib »

sobellian wrote: post #213
griomnib wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They have something Google never had: a paid tier. There are plenty of revenue models aside from ads.

The excluded middle here is a paid tier that nevertheless serves you ads :(

Google was originally fairly egalitarian, OpenAI never was, and never will be. For better or worse.
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