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The man who killed Google Search?

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Re: The man who killed Google Search?

#861

Post by delduca »

kelnos wrote: post #268
delduca wrote: post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Get it until the Manifesto V3.

There's a simple solution to that: stop using Chrome. It is beyond me why so many people still use a web browser made by a company that wants nothing more than to track you and serve you ads. It's maybe excusable or at least understandable that so many average, non-technical users are still on Chrome, but anyone who knows anything about technology? Shame. (Yes, I know, some people actually need to use Chrome for what…

Good luck using Teams or Meet on a non-chrome browser.

Re: The man who killed Google Search?

#862

Post by deanishe »

baryphonic wrote: post #812
freeone3000 wrote: post #694

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When a large search engine deranks spam websites, the spam websites complain! Loudly! With Google they have a big juicy target with lots of competing ventures for an antitrust case; no such luck for Kagi or DDG.

This is an interesting theory. Is there evidence that it's happening? Is Big SEO unreasonably effective at lobbying the Justice Department?

The EU fined Google for prioritising Google Shopping results after complaints by other shopping/price-comparison websites.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antitrust_cases_against_Goog...

Re: The man who killed Google Search?

#863

Post by Nevermark »

JoshTriplett wrote: post #252
Nevermark wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hyperbole that is quite obviously hyperbole is a well accepted literary device. It is a form of highlight via creative exaggeration of non-critical points, that is transparent, not deceptive, in service of making serious adjacent points. [0] The point here is to highlight the actually cartoonish level of dysfunction and damage with an intentionally cartoonish flourish. The "villian" in this case can be colorfully int…

> Hyperbole that is quite obviously hyperbole It's not at all obvious that the author intends to sound hyperbolic. At the risk of Poe's Law here, they come across as saying exactly what they intend to say, perhaps attempting to appeal to an audience looking for such portrayals.

Pinning everything on one manager, no matter how related and relevant, is obviously hyperbolic.

A lot of people, and whover they report to, right to the top, are responsible too.

But the fact remains, that this manager is (according to the essay) strongly associated with major product misfires. At best, they didn’t manage to influence decisions down better paths.

And the enshittification of Google is so obvious, so bad for customers and what has become a utility for the Internet in general, that identifying and shaming those responsible seems like useful customer-citizen feedback to me.

People need to push back as the quality of the online environment matters.

No respect for the value extractors who keep showing up to ride on the coattails of the value makers! (Even when they are the same people.)

The gentleman being called out, or another representative, is welcome to clarify why Google Search is really better than it presents. Or why they are not responsible for its precipitous quality drop - I.e. insurmountable constraints and challenges or whatever their view is. Although those kinds of excuses are not very credible when ad revenue over optimization is the obvious problem.

They are even more welcome to reverse the rot.

Re: The man who killed Google Search?

#864

Post by snewman »

skyfallsin wrote: post #814
gregw134 wrote: post #250

Ex-Google search engineer here (2019-2023). I know a lot of the veteran engineers were upset when Ben Gomes got shunted off. Probably the bigger change, from what I've heard, was losing Amit Singhal who led Search until 2016. Amit fought against creeping complexity. There is a semi-famous internal document he wrote where he argued against the other search leads that Google should use less machine-learning, or at leas…

@gregw134 Thank you for sharing! I've never worked at Google, but really curious what the engineering context is when you say "needs a launch" in the last line.

Guessing: perhaps this means, if someone needs credit for shepherding an improvement to search quality into production, here is a set of known improvements waiting for someone to take ownership.

Re: The man who killed Google Search?

#865

Post by broknbottle »

Terr_ wrote: post #830
1024core wrote: post #523

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> most engineers are drawn to complexity like moth to fire Unfortunately, Google evaluates employees by the complexity of their work. "Demonstrates complexity" is a checkbox on promo packets, from what I've heard. Naturally, every engineer will try to over-complicate things just so they can get the raises and promos. You get what you value.

I've heard a similar critique for Google launching new products and then letting them die, where it's really driven by their policies and practice around what gets someone a promotion and what doesn't.

Yep, promo doc bs that will be immediately abandoned as soon as the promo goes through in X quarter.

Re: The man who killed Google Search?

#866

Post by joenot443 »

barfbagginus wrote: post #761
robertlagrant wrote: post #757

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with the theory in the sense that I agree with the statement "Wouldn't it be nice if you had a genie that grants you wishes?" I disagree with I think every implementation and its death toll, and with the general idea that we should be forming groups to violently gang up on other groups. Whether it's national socialism killing the citizens of other countries and taking their stuff to give to the government to…

[flagged]

You shouldn't use LLMs to generate huge walls of text like this. It's super bad taste.

Re: The man who killed Google Search?

#867

Post by krick »

chrisallenlane wrote: post #846
KetoManx64 wrote: post #841

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://kagi.com/ de-prioritizes SEO ad sites and also lets you blacklist sites from your search reaults. Never going back to google after trying it

I've also been using (and paying for) Kagi for a few months now. It's fantastic.

Feels a bit silly to ask such an anecdotal question to somebody I don't know, but is it really better than Google? If you don't consider all the privacy yadda-yadda issues. I mean more like the size of the index, how quickly it updates things, how good is it at actual searching (like finding an almost exact quote which happens to exist on only one obscure site on the internet), stuff like that. I could also mention stuff like blacklisting doorways, but honestly it's less interesting, and I totally believe that it does it better than Google.

Personally, I use DDG on the daily basis, and it's mostly ok, but very-very far from perfect. More so, at least once in several days I have to switch to Google, because it is seriously better at updating the index, and DDG often fails to find something on some obscure forum, even if I know it's there (because I was a part of discussion myself!) and try to assist it with finding it as much as I can. Also, Google is immensely better at knowing local shops and finding products.

Also, Google search, being bad as it is, it still the only thing I find usable on mobile. First off, it's faster, it is integrated nicely into Pixel UI, and it's somewhat good at all these "more than just a search" type of things, like converting a timezone for me, showing wikipedia summary, flight schedule, etc. Also, integration with Google Maps, working hours and venue locations, it is actually far more reliable than, say, Tripadvisor.

Still, I feel reluctant to vendor-locking myself into payed service unless it's actually far better than everything else and can replace DDG and Google completely.

Re: The man who killed Google Search?

#868

Post by barbariangrunge »

krick wrote: post #867
chrisallenlane wrote: post #846

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've also been using (and paying for) Kagi for a few months now. It's fantastic.

Feels a bit silly to ask such an anecdotal question to somebody I don't know, but is it really better than Google? If you don't consider all the privacy yadda-yadda issues. I mean more like the size of the index, how quickly it updates things, how good is it at actual searching (like finding an almost exact quote which happens to exist on only one obscure site on the internet), stuff like that. I could also mention s…

> Privacy yadda yadda

?

Re: The man who killed Google Search?

#869

Post by [deleted] »

robertlagrant wrote: post #759
jrflowers wrote: post #539

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Robert’s thesis is that there are smart people (like Lisa and himself) that agree that outcomes — no matter how specific or documented — should never be used to criticize managers, and hopelessly stupid people (like Homer) that do not take that position by default. He could have said “perhaps there is a disconnection here” but rather opted to volunteer that he is in fact Very Smart and others are Very Dumb. With a po…

> Robert’s thesis is that there are smart people (like Lisa and himself) that agree that outcomes — no matter how specific or documented — should never be used to criticize managers, and hopelessly stupid people (like Homer) that do not take that position by default. None of the statements in this is the case, other than that there are smart people.

[deleted]

Re: The man who killed Google Search?

#870

Post by exodust »

dpkirchner wrote: post #786
exodust wrote: post #700

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A glowing endorsement, but deserved? Under "more like this" we find multiple hit-pieces by Zitron, hating on one man. You guessed it, Musk Bad Man. Never heard of Zitron, but I won't be back. His bitterness is on verge of unhealthy obsession. Oddly word-stuffed rants, sounds like he spent ages constructing different ways to criticise Musk. > " He has spent $44 billion in an attempt to make people love him only to be…

Musk is objectively a bad man, though. Remember when he called someone a "pedo guy" because that someone dares to disagree with his proposal for saving trapped people? Inexcusable.

You'll need to do better than "pedo-guy" to quality your statement.

What you call "disagree" was actually a public attack from the diver out of nowhere. Musk didn't know him. The guy went to the media and claimed Musk was acting in bad faith by offering a sub to the rescue efforts, and that "Musk can shove his sub up his rear end." It was inexcusable slander out of nowhere. Musk admitted to reacting poorly, apologising more than once including in court. Diver guy tried to sue for $190 million (yep seriously) but was awarded nothing by the jury. Why? Because diver guy was Dickhead A, and Musk was Dickhead B, in a grumpy trash-spat that distracted from the real issue of rescuing the Thai boys. The sub ended up going to the Thai Navy who said they could use it for future rescues.

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