I agree, this is the key insight. Google sees itself as moving toward what I see as a more reddit-like model. People might occasionally click away on links to o

I agree, this is the key insight. Google sees itself as moving toward what I see as a more reddit-like model. People might occasionally click away on links to other sites, but the idea is to keep them on Google's "platform" by default. That's why clicking "X" means "go back to Google", because in this model, you never left. You just temporarily viewed some content in a pane which you are now closing.