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Google Search Is Dying

dkb.io

321–330 of 1001 posts

Re: Google Search Is Dying

#321

Some really good thoughts here. I'll summarize the ones that hit me: - "Why are people searching Reddit specifically? The short answer is that Google search results are clearly dying. The long answer is that most of the web has become too inauthentic to trust." This is it for me exactly. I search for the following kinds of things on Reddit exactly because results on other sites aren't trustworthy: Reviews are secretl…

The reason that the quality on Reddit is higher is because there’s people moderating those quality subreddits. Without those moderators it would all turn to crap and be just as useless as Google.

Re: Google Search Is Dying

#322

Some really good thoughts here. I'll summarize the ones that hit me: - "Why are people searching Reddit specifically? The short answer is that Google search results are clearly dying. The long answer is that most of the web has become too inauthentic to trust." This is it for me exactly. I search for the following kinds of things on Reddit exactly because results on other sites aren't trustworthy: Reviews are secretl…

About the "dead internet conspiracy" - I've worked in writing how-to articles for a fairly large "help" website. They paid very little attention to the quality of the articles. I was paid for each piece and thus had about 30 minutes to write an article and later integrate feedback from internal review. Otherwise the payment became too low. The most important factor was cramming SEO terms and links to keep people on t…

My friend briefly had a copywriting job writing weed strain descriptions for dispensaries. He was never provided the product he was describing, just told to make it up.

Re: Google Search Is Dying

#323
I have been appending reddit to my queries for 1-2 years now. I agree with everything in the article, but I believe that the whole AI trend had a larger negative effect on Google than more ad optimization.

Just like the gmail effect, teams internally have been pushing to integrate AI into search results. Not necessarily because it's the best thing to do, but because someone needs to get promoted. They can't just leave search as it is.

Of course, "best thing to do" is meaningless. What are the metrics? Getting reliable metrics and running big A/B tests is really hard if you have to measure fuzzy things like user satisfaction instead of concrete metrics like CTR. But that's really what's going on here. Initially, users may have been clicking and interacting with results more, but after realizing that those results are not actually what they wanted, or are SEO spam (hello Medium), they become disillusioned and append reddit to their query.

Re: Google Search Is Dying

#324

It's interesting, and quite concerning, that Reddit has cemented its position as a key repository of useful information on just about everything just as its drive towards monetisation really kicks into gear. It's concerning because, as part of that monetisation strategy, Reddit is becoming increasingly walled off and anti-user. I am sure I am only one of many long-time Redditors who have vowed to stop using the site…

It's very interesting to me as somebody's who's been making and burning Reddit accounts since before the Digg implosion. 15 years ago, I trusted what I saw on Reddit when it came to things like products: If I came across a post on the best can openers, I had some certainty that people were just sharing their opinions on can openers.

Now I don't trust a single damn thing I see on that site.

Re: Google Search Is Dying

#325

Still in shock that they killed reverse image search and replaced it with some useless AI tech demo. It used to use the actual image and be able to provide context from where that image was found elsewhere. Now it seems to throw the image at AI and the AI will go "Oh that's a street" then they will just show you streets with similar colors as the image you put in. Completely useless for trying to locate what movie a…

try Yandex, it's really good

Re: Google Search Is Dying

#326
Some years ago, I read an autobiography by Jim Clayton, the founder of mobile home manufacturer Clayton Homes, now a Berkshire Hathaway subsidiary.[a]

One anecdote in the book stuck with me: In the early days of the business, Jim kept getting pestered by salespeople from the Yellow Pages, who told Jim he would benefit from advertising in the Yellow Pages to attract new customers.[b] Jim decided to run a test. He ordered and installed a new red phone in the office, ordered a new phone number just for the red phone, and bought a big ad in the Yellow Pages listing only the line that rang the red phone. The ad ran for a year. No one ever called the red phone. Jim never again spent a cent advertising on the Yellow Pages.

By then, the only consumers and businesses who actually searched the Yellow Pages for products and services were those who didn't have a choice, e.g., out-of-towners needing a plumber who couldn't get the name of a trustworthy plumber from a trusted neighbor.

As regards Google, as its search results and rankings become less trustworthy, more and more people will stop using them to find products and services. Other platforms will benefit, like Reddit. And advertisers will follow, as always.

--

[a] https://www.amazon.com/First-Dream-Jim-Clayton/dp/0972638903...

[b] The Yellow Pages were in essence a low-tech printed-paper version of the search business. Businesses paid to advertise in a thick yellow book, and consumers and businesses searched the index of that book to find products and services. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_pages

Re: Google Search Is Dying

#327

Some really good thoughts here. I'll summarize the ones that hit me: - "Why are people searching Reddit specifically? The short answer is that Google search results are clearly dying. The long answer is that most of the web has become too inauthentic to trust." This is it for me exactly. I search for the following kinds of things on Reddit exactly because results on other sites aren't trustworthy: Reviews are secretl…

That inauthenticity comment really hit home for me, too. I realize that I do not trust the internet at large, and haven't for a long time. That's been the real trigger for my retreat from mass social media into smaller, tigher online communities.

Even HN is starting to feel like it wants to sell me something.

Re: Google Search Is Dying

#328

Some really good thoughts here. I'll summarize the ones that hit me: - "Why are people searching Reddit specifically? The short answer is that Google search results are clearly dying. The long answer is that most of the web has become too inauthentic to trust." This is it for me exactly. I search for the following kinds of things on Reddit exactly because results on other sites aren't trustworthy: Reviews are secretl…

Searching Reddit helps but the quality of comments has gotten lower since 2015 or so. It seems to coincide with the wave of subreddit bans and the nakedly politically-driven moderation on subreddits. And with the reflexive attitude—against anything countering the Reddit consensus—that developed during the Trump years. High quality posters seem to have withdrawn from the site (at least in how much they comment) and wh…

I dunno, looking at the growth curve in Paul Graham’s tweet I expect most of the drop in average comment quality can be attributed to the size of the user base. It’s hard to keep high-quality content the norm even in much smaller communities.

/r/nfl had a reputation for high-quality content and wasn’t a particular battleground in the Trump Wars. It’s still a good breaking news feed, and the live game threads are fun, but every post is dominated by joke comments and memes.

Re: Google Search Is Dying

#329

Many of these articles/complaints don't compare Google Search to alternatives (Bing / DuckDuckGo / ...), so it's not clear whether web search itself is getting "worse" (in the ways mentioned), or whether the issues are with Google Search specifically. (For example, the article proposes the explanation that "The long answer is that most of the web has become too inauthentic to trust" , which is about the web itself, n…

I use DuckDuckGo almost exclusively, and most of the criticisms directed at Google Search also apply to DDG.

I don't think the web can be indexed and searched in the way it has been done. I think it needs human curation.

Re: Google Search Is Dying

#330

All I want is a feature to black list certain domain names from search results. Similar to YouTube never show this channel again option. If google hosted such a feature then they would get a very strong signal on poor results and would go a long way to punishing bad behavior and cleaning up the net. It’s so easy to do that I have to assume they chose not to because they make a percentage of the revenue from the conte…

I’m working on a new search engine that will allow you to do that. (It’s still a work-in-progress, but you can try it out here: https://entfer.com/).
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