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How is search so bad? A case study

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Re: How is search so bad? A case study

#252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The real reason why search is so bad is that Google is downranking the internet. I should know - I blew the whistle on the whole censorship regime and walked 950 pages to the DOJ and media outlets. --> zachvorhies.com What did I disclose? That Google was using a project called "Machine Learning Faireness" to rerank the entire internet. Part of this beast has to do with a secret Page Rank score that Google's army of w…

(I work at Google, but don't work on search) > If wikipedia contains cherry picked slander against a person, topic or website then the raters are instructed to provide a low page rank score This sounds like a good thing to me. Sites that contain lies, fabrications, and falsehoods should not be as highly ranked as those which do not. Why should shareholders sure Google for, as far as I can tell from your argument, try…

Why do your colleagues get to decide what is fact and what is fiction? It's our right, as humans, to be able to make that decision on our own after we encounter information. If Wikipedia gains a reputation for libel, then the onus should be on the public to stop trusting them.

Google does not have the moral authority to censor the internet, and it's absolutely wrong for them to attempt this. Information should be free, and you don't have the right to get in the way of that.

Re: How is search so bad? A case study

#253
post #233

What was the query the author used? Did he try something like this " https://www.google.com/search?sitesearch=reddit.com&q=best+p...

Watch out with doing more complicated searches like extending those to a date range - they get people “banned” from using google search.

Elaborate.

I was doing some deep searching in very specific date ranges with lots of modifiers and google gave me the "your query reminds us of bots or some shit try again later" and I had to stop because it wouldn't let the queries through anymore. Is that what that was?

Re: How is search so bad? A case study

#254
post #88

I have been thinking about the same problem since a few weeks. The real problem with search engines is the fact that so many websites have hacked SEO that there is no meritocracy left. Results are not sorted based on relevance or quality but by SEO experts' efforts at making the search results favor themselves. I can possibly not find anything deep enough about any topic by searching on Google anymore. It's just surf…

> However, it will be interesting to figure the heuristics to deliver better quality search results today. If only there were some kind of analog for effective ways to locate information. Like if everything were written on paper, bound into collections, and then tossed into a large holding room. I guess it's past the Internet's event horizon now, but crawler-primary searching wasn't the only evolutionary path to sear…

"Halt And Catch Fire" had a cool way of taking these 2 approaches of search into their plot line.

Re: How is search so bad? A case study

#255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(I work at Google, but don't work on search) > If wikipedia contains cherry picked slander against a person, topic or website then the raters are instructed to provide a low page rank score This sounds like a good thing to me. Sites that contain lies, fabrications, and falsehoods should not be as highly ranked as those which do not. Why should shareholders sure Google for, as far as I can tell from your argument, try…

Why do your colleagues get to decide what is fact and what is fiction? It's our right, as humans, to be able to make that decision on our own after we encounter information. If Wikipedia gains a reputation for libel, then the onus should be on the public to stop trusting them. Google does not have the moral authority to censor the internet, and it's absolutely wrong for them to attempt this. Information should be fre…

They don't get to decide any such thing, and in fact, can't. Google (fortunately for all of us) doesn't run the Internet.

They do run a popular search page, and have to decide what to do with a search like "Is the Earth flat?".

Personally, I would prefer they prominently display a "no". Others would disagree, but a search engine is curation by definition, that's what makes it useful.

Re: How is search so bad? A case study

#256

I have been thinking about the same problem since a few weeks. The real problem with search engines is the fact that so many websites have hacked SEO that there is no meritocracy left. Results are not sorted based on relevance or quality but by SEO experts' efforts at making the search results favor themselves. I can possibly not find anything deep enough about any topic by searching on Google anymore. It's just surf…

The real reason why search is so bad is that Google is downranking the internet. I should know - I blew the whistle on the whole censorship regime and walked 950 pages to the DOJ and media outlets. --> zachvorhies.com What did I disclose? That Google was using a project called "Machine Learning Faireness" to rerank the entire internet. Part of this beast has to do with a secret Page Rank score that Google's army of w…

Google's search rankings are based on opinions held by other credible sources. This isn't really blowing the whistle when, as you admitted, Google admits this openly.

And maybe your site doesn't get ranked well because it's directly tied to project veritas. I don't like being too political, especially on hn and on an account tied to my real identity, but project veritas and it's associates exhibit appalling behavior in duplicity and misdirection. I would hope that trash like this does get pushed to the bottom.

Re: How is search so bad? A case study

#257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(I work at Google, but don't work on search) > If wikipedia contains cherry picked slander against a person, topic or website then the raters are instructed to provide a low page rank score This sounds like a good thing to me. Sites that contain lies, fabrications, and falsehoods should not be as highly ranked as those which do not. Why should shareholders sure Google for, as far as I can tell from your argument, try…

Why do your colleagues get to decide what is fact and what is fiction? It's our right, as humans, to be able to make that decision on our own after we encounter information. If Wikipedia gains a reputation for libel, then the onus should be on the public to stop trusting them. Google does not have the moral authority to censor the internet, and it's absolutely wrong for them to attempt this. Information should be fre…

Who said anything about censorship? The topic of discussion is what order results are in. Are you saying Google would be more useful if it returned the 100 million results randomly and left you to sort them out?

Re: How is search so bad? A case study

#258

I have been thinking about the same problem since a few weeks. The real problem with search engines is the fact that so many websites have hacked SEO that there is no meritocracy left. Results are not sorted based on relevance or quality but by SEO experts' efforts at making the search results favor themselves. I can possibly not find anything deep enough about any topic by searching on Google anymore. It's just surf…

I’ve found more and more I have reverted to finding books instead of searching to find deeper knowledge. The only issue is it is easy to publish low quality books now. Depending on the topic you are looking into often if a book stands the test of time it is a worthwhile read. With tech books you have to focus on the authors credentials.

Re: How is search so bad? A case study

#259
post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm in the US and Google does not display zachvorhies.com when searching for "zachvorhies.com".

Does for me. USA. [0] https://i.imgur.com/S2rPywz.png Also, is this guy a Q follower or something? The favicon is a Q.

I would think the quotes would make a difference. I was not using quotes, does using quotes in the US still return the website? I would use a VPN and test it out but I am at work right now.

Re: How is search so bad? A case study

#260
post #245
post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[removed, for some reason I thought australia was part of the EU. I'm in the US, also did not see the site link through google]

I'm in the US and I get the same search results. Although if I put in your name, I get your Twitter instead. Not sure why anyone would be searching for a dot com instead of going to it.

Same for me in Australia, searching for the name results in the Twitter handle showing up, and then a WikiSpooks websites and so forth. The website isn't even on the first page. I think that's rather concerning, that searching for a person's won't return their website but rather a twitter feed and other websites that have possibly optimized for SEO.
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