4 ms·

I don't disagree with the core point, but I sort of hate click bait more. It's pretty hyperbolic to call Google results a "full page ad". For example, if I do

I don't disagree with the core point, but I sort of hate click bait more. It's pretty hyperbolic to call Google results a "full page ad". For example, if I do a Google search for "clickbait", on mobile all I see above the fold is a dictionary definition stub followed by a wikipedia snippet. There is actually no sponsored content at all. Even scrolling doesn't turn up any ads. And yes, of course, there are other types of searches where the first thing you'll see is shopping results, followed by more sponsored results. And yes I hate it as much as everyone else. But I don't think it's reasonable to say it's an "ad engine". The amount of real estate devoted to monetization has been increasingly silly for years. It will no doubt get worse. They do have an effective monopoly. It sucks for the internet that this is the case. But Google is still an impressive search engine underneath all the monetization. One where a huge part of the mindshare at the company is still devoted to organic search. I don't think HN is a place where you can reasonably hope to get away with claiming otherwise.

Doctor_Fegg 7y ago
> It's pretty hyperbolic to call Google results a "full page ad". If I search for "lake district cottages" on Google, the first screen is covered by an ad; scroll down, and the second screen is covered by ads too. The third screen is a featured snippet with a map - I have no idea whether this is paid-for. Only halfway down the fourth screen do I get to a genuine organic search result. iPhone SE, Safari, standard text size.
- adrianmonk 7y ago
  I tried the same search on Android. A "featured snippet" covers the first page and more. Tapping on "About Featured Snippets" at the bottom of its UI tile tells me a lot of stuff about it, but doesn't say it's an ad; it says they "come from web search listings" and are highlighted "if it would be useful". I haven't known Google to ever be evasive about whether something is an ad or not, so unless that's changed, I'm confident in concluding this is not an ad. The next thing I see is a tile with a map at the top and three "places" under it, with a way to expand the list via "More places". This doesn't appear to be an ad either. Again not identified as an ad, and I presume these are the most relevant objects from the "places" database that you normally see on Google Maps. After that, it's a series of tiles, each for a web site that appears to be coming from organic search results. So again, not ads. In summary, when I try the same thing on Android, I get no ads at all anywhere. I suppose your results might be different than mine, though. "Lake district cottages" is a term I'd never heard before, and it appears to refer to something in the UK. I'm not in the UK, but maybe you are since you thought to suggest that. (And maybe the ad systems know that and nobody wanted to buy an ad to show to me but somebody did want to buy an ad to show you. That's just speculation, though.)

Doctor_Fegg 7y ago

> It's pretty hyperbolic to call Google results a "full page ad". If I search for "lake district cottages" on Google, the first screen is covered by an ad; scroll down, and the second screen is covered by ads too. The third screen is a featured snippet with a map - I have no idea whether this is paid-for. Only halfway down the fourth screen do I get to a genuine organic search result. iPhone SE, Safari, standard text size.

adrianmonk 7y ago
I tried the same search on Android. A "featured snippet" covers the first page and more. Tapping on "About Featured Snippets" at the bottom of its UI tile tells me a lot of stuff about it, but doesn't say it's an ad; it says they "come from web search listings" and are highlighted "if it would be useful". I haven't known Google to ever be evasive about whether something is an ad or not, so unless that's changed, I'm confident in concluding this is not an ad. The next thing I see is a tile with a map at the top and three "places" under it, with a way to expand the list via "More places". This doesn't appear to be an ad either. Again not identified as an ad, and I presume these are the most relevant objects from the "places" database that you normally see on Google Maps. After that, it's a series of tiles, each for a web site that appears to be coming from organic search results. So again, not ads. In summary, when I try the same thing on Android, I get no ads at all anywhere. I suppose your results might be different than mine, though. "Lake district cottages" is a term I'd never heard before, and it appears to refer to something in the UK. I'm not in the UK, but maybe you are since you thought to suggest that. (And maybe the ad systems know that and nobody wanted to buy an ad to show to me but somebody did want to buy an ad to show you. That's just speculation, though.)