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Every Google result now looks like an ad

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Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad

#851

Post by cmroanirgo »

leokennis wrote: post #804
cmroanirgo wrote: post #613

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are alternative search engines of course. I use StartPage which has the benefit of local results (but can be fully anonymous) but still uses Google search results. DDG is a great alternative, but isn't for me. And then there's Bing

Just FYI, Startpage was recently acquired by a shady company.

Wow. Did not know that, time to move along then. DDG here we go. That said, their privacy policy still looks pretty strong: https://www.startpage.com/en/search/privacy-policy.html

...and at the end of the day, who is actually better out there, and that can prove that no data is leaking? Maybe running your own searx is the only option? (http://asciimoo.github.io/searx/)

Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad

#852

Post by mcbain »

zyx321 wrote: post #849
nikofeyn wrote: post #800

Earlier quoted context omitted.

google amp is a plague on the internet and should have been shutdown by regulators. it is definitely anti-competitive. i am sick and tired of our government completely slaving to the big tech companies when it comes to regulations and anti-competitive behavior. google amp on mobile overrides behavior on mobile, even on android, so instead of web links opening up in the respective and selected default app, it opens up…

Semi-off-topic, but I recently found out that there is an even worse version of AMP, called Google Web Light. Running Firefox on an ARM device (e.g. Raspberry Pi), the results speak for themselves [1]. Notably, there is absolutely no way for the end user to disable it, short of spoofing your user agent. [1] https://googleweblight.com/i?u=https://news.ycombinator.com/...

Truthful name, though? Google, we blight.

Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad

#853

Post by goatinaboat »

jansan wrote: post #785
mekster wrote: post #768

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Thanks for ruining the Web, Google. So, they helped make the web a far easier place to look around on things for a few decades and one layout change and you call them that they ruined the web? It's easy to be on the barking side.

Google gave us a lot, but that does not mean they should not be criticized. Without emotion I can say that using Google is far worse today than it was in the early 2000s. Besides delivering the results in a much more readable format, at that time we were able to search specifically in forums and there were a lot of advanced features like "linkto:" that are not supported anymore. The problem I see is that Google does…

They are 100% focused on consumers now, and that sucks a lot.

Focused on exploiting consumers, that is. Consumers are the livestock in Google’s factory farm. They are actively hostile to end users now.

Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad

#854

Post by type0 »

Twirrim wrote: post #200
ping_pong wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

AMP isn't being forced on websites, they choose to enable it or not.

Yeah and death row prisoners choose their last meal /s

Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad

#855

Post by imron »

rocqua wrote: post #848
elsewhen wrote: post #738

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My understanding is that they are optimizing for revenue per visitor per month- they are not trying to make the most visually appealing product.

That's a scary optimization to make if it starts costing you visitors.

They'll make it up in volume /s

Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad

#856

Post by charlesism »

mekster wrote: post #768
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…

> Thanks for ruining the Web, Google. So, they helped make the web a far easier place to look around on things for a few decades and one layout change and you call them that they ruined the web? It's easy to be on the barking side.

Google has done away with most of its original competitive advantages. Its biggest advantages now are its name recognition and its size. If Google had started off with paid search results and what-you-search-for-is-not-what-you-get we'd probably all still be using Altavista.

Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad

#857

Post by IanSanders »

noja wrote: post #293
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…

I can't mentally parse the results anywhere near as fast as I used to be able to. It's horrible.

Mission accomplished?

Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad

#858

Post by gwenzek »

choathedolls wrote: post #686
jwond wrote: post #577

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You might like DuckDuckGo and “bangs”. https://duckduckgo.com/bang

For anyone reading this thinking "what a killer feature I need to switch to DDG now". All browsers do this natively now. In Chromium engines it's found under "Manage Search Engine". In Firefox it's under "One Click Search Engine".

The point of bang is that I don't have to setup anything. And it's pretty exhaustive I often use !gten, !gtfr or !gtes to specify the target language for Google translate. I'm glad I don't have to setup all this by myself, every time I change browser.

Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad

#859

Post by IanSanders »

winrid wrote: post #627
pushcx wrote: post #29

https://www.google.com/about/honestresults/ It's a little confusing to read now, so for context: at the time Google published this, it only put ads in the sidebar to the right of search results. This post was written to criticize the practice of putting ads atop search results, which competitors sometimes formatted almost indistinguishably from organic search results.

You can tell that's old because it's only ~200kb...

And even that can be considered excessive for what it is. Sad.

Re: Every Google result now looks like an ad

#860

Post by tripzilch »

rpastuszak wrote: post #833
tjoff wrote: post #822

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unless I misunderstood, that is something you disable in each (google)app that has that "feature". In Gmail for instance: settings: General settings: Open links in gmail. Turn on for "faster" browsing. Default is on. Tip: Use firefox focus instead as the default browser to open all links. If the link warrants further look copy the url to your main browser. The above has nothing to do with amp. But to not detract, amp…

Thanks for the tip. Most of the people here would fix that somehow, e.g. by tweaking browser settings, finding and following comments like yours. But, why does someone who doesn't deal with tech have to think about that, and will they, should they? I find their UX approach to SEO more concerning than, say, scoring. For example, AMP pages will receive the same score as equally performant non-AMP content. However, they…

> Internet feels more hostile than it used to.

It's not Internet, it's software.

You can really feel it when switching from Android to LineageOS, or from Windows to Linux.

It's the difference between software where "you are the product" and software that has been created to serve the user, to be the best tool it can be.

I'm not talking about UX in the sense that open source software can sometimes feel clunky and unfinished, but I'm talking about breath of freedom you feel when you switch, and suddenly ... you notice that this current you have been forced to swim against, just isn't there any more.

I helped a friend get LineageOS on his bootlooped phone, and he's so happy with it. All these features in the settings that are actually helpful (when in Android you always have to second guess, you know that feeling when a setting's description is really vague and uninformative, "this is probably going to spy on me", is it vaguely positive or negative, because the switch can go either way). All the very basic features that would otherwise require an ad-filled app to perform, of course already there. You get privacy controls that aren't mystifying or reset on updates.

Similarly, I've now been on Instagram for about half a year. Always avoided FB, but there's some art I wanted to put out there, so I gave it a try. And oh my god, Instagram is probably the shittiest software ever? Or at least the most user hostile. It's a social thing where you can share images, comments and messages. Except it isn't, it just appears like one. Literally every interaction feels forced, to show me more ads, make me spend more time in this app (??) and mainly constantly throwing up barriers against interacting with any kind of software or data outside its ecosystem. You can't upload from your laptop, many links are not clickable, many text fields are not copyable, most features in the browser are locked unless you make it pretend to be an iPhone (!!), you can't post or reply to comments. The chat is such basic functionality that it seems hard to fuck up but they did. I should stop, but I can go on ...

This is that feeling of constantly swimming against a current, and somehow we're tricked into believing that is how it's supposed to be, because ... I don't know, some people told me when I complained, that most people don't use instagram in the way I do. Well I guess, but that doesn't seem to be most people's choice.

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