Live data from Hacker News

Why has examine.com disappeared from search results?

examine.com

261–270 of 363 posts

Re: Why has examine.com disappeared from search results?

#261
post #20

I was going to say that "examine.com is one of the best sites on the internet for information about supplements/nutrition". But it's not. It's the best site on the internet for that sort of thing. It's great that Google is attempting to fix the issue of bullshit nutrition sites ranking highly, but I sincerely hope someone at Google sees this and does something to help out Examine, which is a tremendous resource.

At this moment the only thing we almost surely know about nutrition is we do not know one goddamn thing about it. For a popular version, see Ben Goldacre's Bad Pharma.

Re: Why has examine.com disappeared from search results?

#262

Examine.com is rock solid in my opinion. Best summary of research (with direct links to each published paper) that I’ve seen. I often use examine.com directly without going through Google but I hope Google will realize they have made a mistake in this case.

P.S. I'm not associated with Examine.com in any way except for using the site regularly.

Re: Why has examine.com disappeared from search results?

#263
post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think I've come across the site before, but at first glance it doesn't look reputable at all. --I realize that looks aren't everything, but I see the following that look like red flags to me: 1. They show logs for news sources such as The New York Times, BBC, etc., but they don't actually link to those sites, let alone to articles that actually mention this site. 2. I see click-bait titles like "The top 19 nu…

Let me address these: 1. No one links to them. You are welcome to google. Eg here: https://www.nytimes.com/guides/year-of-living-better/how-to-... - you'll see their entire supplement section is from our site 2. That is our one, and it's more of a play on 2019 and 19. If you read the article, you'll see it's no-nosense. 3. How exactly do I prove someone is real? A quick google search shows this guy: https://twitter.c…

Hahahaha, this is largely unrelated, but I can attest that mike is a real person — he and I taught tennis together 12 years ago. Small world.

Re: Why has examine.com disappeared from search results?

#264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"You (or other skeptics), saying it's not a great resource (while ignoring all evidence already provided)." No, simply pointing out that it's your job in this discussion to present that evidence, not to try the frequently disingenuous tactics of "Oh, if you knew anything about this subject you'd know this is the greatest site EVAR" or "I'm saying this site is great. You have to do the legwork to dare to doubt me!". I…

"No, simply pointing out that it's your job in this discussion to present that evidence" I have provided evidence. (I've even included the unique evidence of personal experience. Hundreds of hours of research & experimentation- research on multiple websites- from someone with no vested financial interest, should count for something.) I am also asserting that skeptics should also provide evidence. It's like in a court…

You're clearly not familiar with the "burden of proof" principle. Go ahead, google it, especially given that you mention legal cases. The person who makes a particular assertion has the onus of proving the same. Like one of the previous posters said, we are flooded with people making bullshit claims of how something like homeopathy "works" because they know it from personal experience, and we shouldn't have to be the ones to disprove nonsense like that.

> It's like in a courtroom- both the prosecution and the defense should provide evidence.

You're mistaken. In criminal cases, the burden is on the prosecution to establish their case beyond all reasonable doubt. The defence does not have to prove innocence; it merely has to establish there is insufficient evidence for a guilty verdict.

Re: Why has examine.com disappeared from search results?

#265
post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. There is no good reason not to link to them, there are only bad reasons not to link to them. You're not linking to them because they're not outright endorsements, and you know it. 2. The item below that is '4 science-based “superfoods” you should consider eating'. That's pretty much just as much click-bait as the other. 3. You link to the person providing the review, preferably to a page where they actually say th…

You are literally trying to find things to complain about. 1. It's standard MO not to. We never even claimed outright endorsements... 2. Did you click on the link? We immediately say how superfoods do not exist. As I said - just trying to fight it. 3. Anahand literally decided to quote the entire supplement section of his strength building guide (which was a section in the published newspaper) to us. If that's not an…

Sorry you're having to defend yourself so much. I just discovered the site from this post, and it's excellent.

Re: Why has examine.com disappeared from search results?

#266
post #20

I was going to say that "examine.com is one of the best sites on the internet for information about supplements/nutrition". But it's not. It's the best site on the internet for that sort of thing. It's great that Google is attempting to fix the issue of bullshit nutrition sites ranking highly, but I sincerely hope someone at Google sees this and does something to help out Examine, which is a tremendous resource.

Personally, I've found how they aggregate research and list it a valuable resource for how I continue my own research on a particular supplement.

I find it much more valuable than the empty Mayo Clinic and WebMD articles that are so conservative in the information they provide that it's basically just reading common knowledge.

I think if you're using one site for your source of information for supplements, you're doing a disservice to yourself and potentially putting your body in harms way. So, with that said -- I also do not think Google should be removing this from their search results.

Re: Why has examine.com disappeared from search results?

#267
post #20

I was going to say that "examine.com is one of the best sites on the internet for information about supplements/nutrition". But it's not. It's the best site on the internet for that sort of thing. It's great that Google is attempting to fix the issue of bullshit nutrition sites ranking highly, but I sincerely hope someone at Google sees this and does something to help out Examine, which is a tremendous resource.

Also take a look at selfhacked.com. It's a treasure.

Selfhacked doesn't vet or validate very well. Tons of information that makes you feel like everything under the sun is going to solve your issues, but without the extreme evidence required to prove it.

Re: Why has examine.com disappeared from search results?

#268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretty sure they dropped the don't be evil moniker when they decided to go full steam ahead with evil

They changed it with "Do the right thing", which is equivalent to saying "Evil is sometimes the right thing"

Alphabet adopted the motto "Do the right thing". Google still has the motto "Don't be evil". Both are in their respective codes of conducts.

Re: Why has examine.com disappeared from search results?

#269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They also recently went through a redesign and I think it's really clean. But yeah, idk about their homepage and stuff, but go on any of their pages for a specific supplement and every sentence is thoroughly cited. It's also a great resource for finding relevant studies if you wanna do your own research.

> They also recently went through a redesign In my experience, this is often the cause of mysterious drops in search ranking. It's very easy to inadvertently introduce changes that negatively impact your ranking without even noticing. At a quick glance, I noticed that many articles on examine.com link to hundreds of external references (e.g. more than half the page of https://examine.com/supplements/creatine/ ). In I…

There are almost always drop offs when you redesign and Google reevaluates your content, sure add back in no follow if you like but Google is really clever. It sees every page on the site has changed to something else; if that is a recent change we’ll go with Occam’s razor here.

Re: Why has examine.com disappeared from search results?

#270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Right then. Quoting papers makes you a reliable expert and able to make claims about medicine and science and health. Does being a researcher or doctor make you a reliable expert and able to make claims about medicine and science and health? It is very good to doubt papers. In doing so you are doubting countless scientists [many of whom perform poor studies] though. There isn't any thing epistemologically sacred ab…

> Does being a researcher or doctor make you a reliable expert and able to make claims about medicine and science and health? Doubting people quoting papers, and doubting papers are two fundamentally different things.

They're not really doing much that isn't in the papers they're quoting. Their flaws, of which there are certainly many, stem from the flaws in those papers. That's a rather hard problem to fix, so I have trouble faulting them.
Post reply on HN