9 ms·

Here is an example: http://www.gnoosic.com/discussion/metallica5.html http://www.gnoosic.com/discussion/metallica5.html No matter how you search for the c

Here is an example: http://www.gnoosic.com/discussion/metallica__5.html http://www.gnoosic.com/discussion/metallica__5.html No matter how you search for the content on Google, nothing comes up: https://www.google.com/search?q="Metallica+only+played+2+songs+from+St.+Anger" https://www.google.com/search?q="Metallica+only+played+2+son... DuckDuckGo has it: https://duckduckgo.com/?q="Metallica+only+played+2+songs+from+St.+Anger" https://duckduckgo.com/?q="Metallica+only+played+2+songs+fro... I checked the wayback machine and the content has constantly been on that url for over 10 years. This is the first example of an old forum page I tried after reading the article. So I tend to think it's true. Google is discarding the "classic" web.

vissi 8y ago
Well, search may have bugs (or undocumented features) too, I have googled content from other pages on this site (related to Metallica). Page 6 for example: https://www.google.com/search?q=%22Listen+up+you+fags+metallica+IS+THE+MOST+OVERATED%22&oq=%22Listen+up+you+fags+metallica+IS+THE+MOST+OVERATED%22&aqs=chrome..69i57.881j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8 https://www.google.com/search?q=%22Listen+up+you+fags+metall...
- founderling 8y ago
  I don't think the articles premise is that Google axed all content older then 5 years or so. But that it gradually discards old unique content. Which goes against the original mission of Google to "organize the world's information and make it universally accessible". A "bug" could be an option, but I don't expect that to be the reason. It's too easy to find examples of forgotten content. And I don't think a bug of that magnitude in Googles core business would go unnoticed.
  - misterman0 8y ago
    >> Googles core business Which core business are you referring to?
    - dx034 8y ago
      Search. They still form a major part of their business. Through direct ad revenues but also to redirect traffic to other Google products (e.g. Maps, Youtube).
omaranto 8y ago
Interestingly, even though DuckDuckGo finds the post, Bing doesn't seem to.
- JetSpiegel 8y ago
  It's on Yandex. https://www.yandex.ru/yandsearch?text=Metallica%20only%20played%202%20songs%20from%20St.%20Anger&lr=213 https://www.yandex.ru/yandsearch?text=Metallica%20only%20pla...
  - icebraining 8y ago
    Not showing up here. Not even if I add quotes.
    - JetSpiegel 8y ago
      I tried with quotes and it doesn't show up, ironically. It must be without quotes. It forced my to solve a bunch of CAPTCHAS too.
  - PopeDotNinja 8y ago
    This is reminding me of the meta search engines that consolidated results from multiple sources. I haven't used one of those in probably 15 years.
- founderling 8y ago
  I do see it on Bing. Also on the "Million Short" search engine mentioned by kickscondor: https://millionshort.com/search?keywords=%22Metallica%20only%20played%202%20songs%20from%20St.%20Anger%22&remove=0&shopping=&country=&chat= https://millionshort.com/search?keywords=%22Metallica%20only... I never saw that one. Do they have their own crawler?
kyrra 8y ago
https://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Awww.gnoosic.com+Metallica https://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Awww.gnoosic.com+Metal... Looks like only page 6 is indexed for some reason. The site owner would be able to check the webmaster tools on Google to see why.
- quest88 8y ago
  Probably because the site is not https, and Google rank includes https: https://www.sangfroidwebdesign.com/search-engine-optimization-seo/google-https-ranking/ https://www.sangfroidwebdesign.com/search-engine-optimizatio...
- hokus 8y ago
  there are 3 parties: the end user searching for the content the webmaster or author of the content the search provider If I'm searching for something that I know exists and I cant find it there is no excuse. The search provider failed to do its job. There is not but the webmaster should have done this and that. He was hit by a bus 10 years ago and we should be happy the content is still available. A good search provider would link a vanished website to archive org if the content is exactly what the customer wanted. Long long ago when posting interesting links in comments didn't trigger commercial hysteria people would cite bits of texts and have a link to the full text. Later this became simply citing a chunk of text. I use to drop a few lines from the citation into the search engine and find the original work. Just look! https://www.google.com/search?q=Looks+like+only+page+6+is+indexed+for+some+reason.+The+site+owner+would+be+able+to+check+the+webmaster+tools+on+Google+to+see+why https://www.google.com/search?q=Looks+like+only+page+6+is+in.... As i'm writing this there are exactly 45 search results above the one that should have been displayed. There is no excuse like HN not ranking enough, they didn't not index the page, the other results didn't match the query better. If we do this with 4 exact lines from a less popular site it will end up some place on page 20 of the search results. Another example, I really don't care for indexing but here is an article that I always (jokingly) refer to as my greatest work. The exact title: https://www.google.com/search?q=%22the+wrath+of+the+book%22 https://www.google.com/search?q=%22the+wrath+of+the+book%22 A really weird result. Safe to say nothing matching is there. The first many words from the text: https://www.google.com/search?q=I+think+someone+%28you%29+should+write+a+book+about+the+damage+books+did+to+humanity.+Like+when+the+radio+replaced+singing+story+telling+became+story https://www.google.com/search?q=I+think+someone+%28you%29+sh... It doesn't find it. Then we check if it is even indexed... https://www.google.com/search?q=http%3A%2F%2Fblog.go-here.nl%2F8616 https://www.google.com/search?q=http%3A%2F%2Fblog.go-here.nl... And there it is! Why does it even crawl the page? It also lists websites that have the number 8616 on them and ones with both the word "blog" and "here" in the text. I'm not suppose to laugh?
kgersen75 8y ago
page 5 seems not indexed. Everything on others pages can be found with Google. you can force the site with "site:... ": https://www.google.com/search?q="metallica+only+played+2+songs+from+st.+anger"+site%3Agnoosic.com https://www.google.com/search?q="metallica+only+played+2+son... it's doesn't find page 5 with these terms but find page 6. There is probably an issue within the page 5 itself.
asark 8y ago
I've had this problem recently. I can craft a search for something just slightly obscure and specific that should, nonetheless, have had plenty of hits on the "old web", let alone now on the many-times-larger web. But "no pages found". Loosen up the search and it's nothing but Google-friendly blogspam that isn't remotely related to what I'm trying to find. I call bullshit.
- behringer 8y ago
  Loosen it up? You mean google didn't automatically remove your keywords for you?
  - asark 8y ago
    Heh, oh yeah, tons of that, usually the ones most relevant to narrowing the search beyond "everything on the Web". Thanks, Google. So then I do the quotes thing, especially quoting phrases that 100% for sure must exist on some web pages, along with all my other keywords and pretty soon I'm at "no pages found". Pull back just a little, and it's page after page of entirely unrelated-to-what-I-want blogspam.
justbaker 8y ago
Seeing Metallica on HN makes me feel much more welcome :)
Liquix 8y ago
Anecdotally and perhaps unrelated - has anyone else noticed a decrease in the accuracy and general quality of Google search over the past 2-4 months? They've had to have been utilizing ML to 'improve' searches for some time now, but the quality of the results has decreased suddenly and inexplicably (for me).
- wyck 8y ago
  Yes, i'm having to go several pages deep and even then not finding anything relevant, I've started to use other search engines and reddit to actually find useful info.
  - Liquix 8y ago
    Google poured billions into their search engine for two decades to make it better. Now that have a ridiculous amount of money and power, the search results get.... objectively worse. Which brings us to the elephant in the room: what are Google's motives behind this (clearly intentional) change? Could something as innocent as training a new neural net or testing a buggy version of the algorithm on subsets of users. But it could also be as sinister as driving traffic to those in bed with Google, silencing opposition, or effectively whitewashing the entire internet...
    - lnanek2 8y ago
      Maybe bad organic results lead to more ad clicks.
      - Liquix 8y ago
        Most definitely. But the folk at Google are very smart, very rich, and already run the most lucrative ad platform in the world. Wouldn't hamstringing their flagship product for the sake of a few extra $B/yr harm them in the long run as more and more users switch to other search engines? They had to have considered that and made the change anyway. What's the endgame? I don't feel it's more ad clicks.
icebraining 8y ago
From what I can tell, there's no links anywhere on the site to that particular page, you have to know the exact term and search it: http://www.gnoosic.com/discussion/ http://www.gnoosic.com/discussion/ How is Google supposed to find that out?!
- throwaway2048 8y ago
  How are you determining nothing links this? Google?
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - icebraining 8y ago
    No, I'm browsing the site and I'm unable to find any links to those band-specific pages.
- dx034 8y ago
  That's a good point. Googlebot probably wouldn't try out combinations in the search box, so unless the site owner provides a sitemap Google wouldn't know about entries.
zepearl 8y ago
Thanks a lot for the example!

Here is an example: http://www.gnoosic.com/discussion/metallica__5.html http://www.gnoosic.com/discussion/metallica__5.html No matter how you search for the c

vissi 8y ago

Well, search may have bugs (or undocumented features) too, I have googled content from other pages on this site (related to Metallica). Page 6 for example: https://www.google.com/search?q=%22Listen+up+you+fags+metallica+IS+THE+MOST+OVERATED%22&oq=%22Listen+up+you+fags+metallica+IS+THE+MOST+OVERATED%22&aqs=chrome..69i57.881j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8 https://www.google.com/search?q=%22Listen+up+you+fags+metall...

founderling 8y ago
I don't think the articles premise is that Google axed all content older then 5 years or so. But that it gradually discards old unique content. Which goes against the original mission of Google to "organize the world's information and make it universally accessible". A "bug" could be an option, but I don't expect that to be the reason. It's too easy to find examples of forgotten content. And I don't think a bug of that magnitude in Googles core business would go unnoticed.
- misterman0 8y ago
  >> Googles core business Which core business are you referring to?
  - dx034 8y ago
    Search. They still form a major part of their business. Through direct ad revenues but also to redirect traffic to other Google products (e.g. Maps, Youtube).

omaranto 8y ago

Interestingly, even though DuckDuckGo finds the post, Bing doesn't seem to.

JetSpiegel 8y ago
It's on Yandex. https://www.yandex.ru/yandsearch?text=Metallica%20only%20played%202%20songs%20from%20St.%20Anger&lr=213 https://www.yandex.ru/yandsearch?text=Metallica%20only%20pla...
- icebraining 8y ago
  Not showing up here. Not even if I add quotes.
  - JetSpiegel 8y ago
    I tried with quotes and it doesn't show up, ironically. It must be without quotes. It forced my to solve a bunch of CAPTCHAS too.
- PopeDotNinja 8y ago
  This is reminding me of the meta search engines that consolidated results from multiple sources. I haven't used one of those in probably 15 years.
founderling 8y ago
I do see it on Bing. Also on the "Million Short" search engine mentioned by kickscondor: https://millionshort.com/search?keywords=%22Metallica%20only%20played%202%20songs%20from%20St.%20Anger%22&remove=0&shopping=&country=&chat= https://millionshort.com/search?keywords=%22Metallica%20only... I never saw that one. Do they have their own crawler?

kyrra 8y ago

https://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Awww.gnoosic.com+Metallica https://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Awww.gnoosic.com+Metal... Looks like only page 6 is indexed for some reason. The site owner would be able to check the webmaster tools on Google to see why.

quest88 8y ago
Probably because the site is not https, and Google rank includes https: https://www.sangfroidwebdesign.com/search-engine-optimization-seo/google-https-ranking/ https://www.sangfroidwebdesign.com/search-engine-optimizatio...
hokus 8y ago
there are 3 parties: the end user searching for the content the webmaster or author of the content the search provider If I'm searching for something that I know exists and I cant find it there is no excuse. The search provider failed to do its job. There is not but the webmaster should have done this and that. He was hit by a bus 10 years ago and we should be happy the content is still available. A good search provider would link a vanished website to archive org if the content is exactly what the customer wanted. Long long ago when posting interesting links in comments didn't trigger commercial hysteria people would cite bits of texts and have a link to the full text. Later this became simply citing a chunk of text. I use to drop a few lines from the citation into the search engine and find the original work. Just look! https://www.google.com/search?q=Looks+like+only+page+6+is+indexed+for+some+reason.+The+site+owner+would+be+able+to+check+the+webmaster+tools+on+Google+to+see+why https://www.google.com/search?q=Looks+like+only+page+6+is+in.... As i'm writing this there are exactly 45 search results above the one that should have been displayed. There is no excuse like HN not ranking enough, they didn't not index the page, the other results didn't match the query better. If we do this with 4 exact lines from a less popular site it will end up some place on page 20 of the search results. Another example, I really don't care for indexing but here is an article that I always (jokingly) refer to as my greatest work. The exact title: https://www.google.com/search?q=%22the+wrath+of+the+book%22 https://www.google.com/search?q=%22the+wrath+of+the+book%22 A really weird result. Safe to say nothing matching is there. The first many words from the text: https://www.google.com/search?q=I+think+someone+%28you%29+should+write+a+book+about+the+damage+books+did+to+humanity.+Like+when+the+radio+replaced+singing+story+telling+became+story https://www.google.com/search?q=I+think+someone+%28you%29+sh... It doesn't find it. Then we check if it is even indexed... https://www.google.com/search?q=http%3A%2F%2Fblog.go-here.nl%2F8616 https://www.google.com/search?q=http%3A%2F%2Fblog.go-here.nl... And there it is! Why does it even crawl the page? It also lists websites that have the number 8616 on them and ones with both the word "blog" and "here" in the text. I'm not suppose to laugh?

kgersen75 8y ago

page 5 seems not indexed. Everything on others pages can be found with Google. you can force the site with "site:... ": https://www.google.com/search?q="metallica+only+played+2+songs+from+st.+anger"+site%3Agnoosic.com https://www.google.com/search?q="metallica+only+played+2+son... it's doesn't find page 5 with these terms but find page 6. There is probably an issue within the page 5 itself.

asark 8y ago

I've had this problem recently. I can craft a search for something just slightly obscure and specific that should, nonetheless, have had plenty of hits on the "old web", let alone now on the many-times-larger web. But "no pages found". Loosen up the search and it's nothing but Google-friendly blogspam that isn't remotely related to what I'm trying to find. I call bullshit.

behringer 8y ago
Loosen it up? You mean google didn't automatically remove your keywords for you?
- asark 8y ago
  Heh, oh yeah, tons of that, usually the ones most relevant to narrowing the search beyond "everything on the Web". Thanks, Google. So then I do the quotes thing, especially quoting phrases that 100% for sure must exist on some web pages, along with all my other keywords and pretty soon I'm at "no pages found". Pull back just a little, and it's page after page of entirely unrelated-to-what-I-want blogspam.

justbaker 8y ago

Seeing Metallica on HN makes me feel much more welcome :)

Liquix 8y ago

Anecdotally and perhaps unrelated - has anyone else noticed a decrease in the accuracy and general quality of Google search over the past 2-4 months? They've had to have been utilizing ML to 'improve' searches for some time now, but the quality of the results has decreased suddenly and inexplicably (for me).

wyck 8y ago
Yes, i'm having to go several pages deep and even then not finding anything relevant, I've started to use other search engines and reddit to actually find useful info.
- Liquix 8y ago
  Google poured billions into their search engine for two decades to make it better. Now that have a ridiculous amount of money and power, the search results get.... objectively worse. Which brings us to the elephant in the room: what are Google's motives behind this (clearly intentional) change? Could something as innocent as training a new neural net or testing a buggy version of the algorithm on subsets of users. But it could also be as sinister as driving traffic to those in bed with Google, silencing opposition, or effectively whitewashing the entire internet...
  - lnanek2 8y ago
    Maybe bad organic results lead to more ad clicks.
    - Liquix 8y ago
      Most definitely. But the folk at Google are very smart, very rich, and already run the most lucrative ad platform in the world. Wouldn't hamstringing their flagship product for the sake of a few extra $B/yr harm them in the long run as more and more users switch to other search engines? They had to have considered that and made the change anyway. What's the endgame? I don't feel it's more ad clicks.

icebraining 8y ago

From what I can tell, there's no links anywhere on the site to that particular page, you have to know the exact term and search it: http://www.gnoosic.com/discussion/ http://www.gnoosic.com/discussion/ How is Google supposed to find that out?!

throwaway2048 8y ago
How are you determining nothing links this? Google?
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- icebraining 8y ago
  No, I'm browsing the site and I'm unable to find any links to those band-specific pages.
dx034 8y ago
That's a good point. Googlebot probably wouldn't try out combinations in the search box, so unless the site owner provides a sitemap Google wouldn't know about entries.

zepearl 8y ago

Thanks a lot for the example!