5 ms·

Comparisons of mattress materials or brands, histories of different mattresses used by cultures, forums for mattress aficionados, tutorials for making your own

Comparisons of mattress materials or brands, histories of different mattresses used by cultures, forums for mattress aficionados, tutorials for making your own or modifying mattresses, general mattress information or facts, other random weird shit the internet used to have about strangely niche subjects that have way more people dedicated to them then you'd expect you'd only discover by searching random terms then you find there's a whole world of weird things dedicated to this niche topic, say mattresses in this case, that you'd otherwise never know about.

teruakohatu 6y ago
"mattress forums" find me forums. "mattress history" gets me a page entitled "The History of Mattresses" followed by Wikipedia.
cbo100 6y ago
Then perhaps try searching "mattress materials", "history of mattresses" or "mattress making tutorial". Plenty of relevant results, zero ads. When somebody searches "mattress", 99% of the time, they want to buy one.
- grawprog 6y ago
  So, if I want a page full of ads, by yours and the other commenter's examples, I should have to type in 'buy mattress' or 'mattress shopping' shouldn't I? Why should just searching the word mattress imply I'm looking to buy one? Ideally, if I search for just mattress, I should get a little bit of all those things in one search, including a few ads to buy one, but it shouldn't be everything.
  - johnday 6y ago
    You seem to have missed the critical point from the person you're responding to: > When somebody searches "mattress", 99% of the time, they want to buy one. This is unfounded I suspect but it would be a reasonable justification for Google's results.
    - grawprog 6y ago
      Reasonable justification != Reasonable My point is, searching for just mattress should reasonably and logically include a small sampling of 'all' related topics. As by your own words, specific implications behind the search should be left to additional keywords. Assuming the search is for the purposes of buying, without specifying that, is certainly more profitable to google than a small sampling of all related topics, but not what most users want when simply searching for a vague general thing or concept.
      - johnday 6y ago
        Suppose that we know, axiomatically, that 99% of people who search "mattresses" want to buy a mattress. Search engine A, when someone queries "mattress", shows a page of options to buy a mattress. Search engine B, when someone queries "mattress", shows a light touch on a number of different aspects of mattresses, including a history, the wikipedia page, and so on. Which one is doing a better job of showing relevant results to the user? I would suggest A.
joshvm 6y ago
Good luck finding a comparison page of just about anything that isn't SEO spam these days. And I would bet money if you search for DIY mattress, a good fraction of the results will be Pinterest.
- freediver 6y ago
  It should not be your job to do that, but of the trillion dollar company whose stated mission literally is 'organizing world's information'. The inversion of roles is the problem.
bagacrap 6y ago
what is a "general mattress fact"? If you typed "mattress Wikipedia" you'd get a bunch of mattress history and facts, so it's not exactly hard to find what you're looking for, but it's probably the case that most people who type just "mattress" are looking to buy one. If that weren't true, why would Google show so many ads? It's not like showing a million ads is going to trick a seeker of general mattress facts into buying a mattress they don't need.
- fragmede 6y ago
  It's trivial to find "random fun mattress facts" by Googling for exactly that, but thanks to link and content aggregators, instead of flipping through channels on the tee-vee, we scroll for miles with our thumbs. Before commercial interests took over the web, it was full of weird and wonderful sites by hobby enthusiasts, built in their spare time that would have random weird facts and stories. For better or worse, that Internet is behind us now, so it's rare to come across that sort of treasure trove of a site. (To be clear, there's better and worse today, compared to the Internet of yore.) What's the case here, is that mattress store owners, in the conversion to online sales, have purchased, not only the adword for "mattress", but paid for all manner of SEO tricks and hackery in order to drive their site to the top of the results. Far in excess of what a hobbyist could or would bother with. It's a long shot, but the long tail of the Internet says that this has happened at least once. Someone was just poking around came across a random mattress myth or fact page, and found out that something they hate about their mattress isn't something they have to put up with. Whether that's "being tricked" into buying a mattress they didn't need, I won't say, but it still tickles an intellectually curious itch that I didn't even know I had, to find out that it’s illegal to purchase a mattress on Sundays in Washington. A single word query like "mattress" is vague and starting from first principles, we live under capitalism, assume everyone's trying to sell you something, and a search for "mattress" proves to be no exception. Same goes for if you search for "windows". Second link is how to get it (for $199).
- anoncake 6y ago
  > why would Google show so many ads Because that's their business?

teruakohatu 6y ago

"mattress forums" find me forums. "mattress history" gets me a page entitled "The History of Mattresses" followed by Wikipedia.

cbo100 6y ago

Then perhaps try searching "mattress materials", "history of mattresses" or "mattress making tutorial". Plenty of relevant results, zero ads. When somebody searches "mattress", 99% of the time, they want to buy one.

grawprog 6y ago
So, if I want a page full of ads, by yours and the other commenter's examples, I should have to type in 'buy mattress' or 'mattress shopping' shouldn't I? Why should just searching the word mattress imply I'm looking to buy one? Ideally, if I search for just mattress, I should get a little bit of all those things in one search, including a few ads to buy one, but it shouldn't be everything.
- johnday 6y ago
  You seem to have missed the critical point from the person you're responding to: > When somebody searches "mattress", 99% of the time, they want to buy one. This is unfounded I suspect but it would be a reasonable justification for Google's results.
  - grawprog 6y ago
    Reasonable justification != Reasonable My point is, searching for just mattress should reasonably and logically include a small sampling of 'all' related topics. As by your own words, specific implications behind the search should be left to additional keywords. Assuming the search is for the purposes of buying, without specifying that, is certainly more profitable to google than a small sampling of all related topics, but not what most users want when simply searching for a vague general thing or concept.
    - johnday 6y ago
      Suppose that we know, axiomatically, that 99% of people who search "mattresses" want to buy a mattress. Search engine A, when someone queries "mattress", shows a page of options to buy a mattress. Search engine B, when someone queries "mattress", shows a light touch on a number of different aspects of mattresses, including a history, the wikipedia page, and so on. Which one is doing a better job of showing relevant results to the user? I would suggest A.

joshvm 6y ago

Good luck finding a comparison page of just about anything that isn't SEO spam these days. And I would bet money if you search for DIY mattress, a good fraction of the results will be Pinterest.

freediver 6y ago
It should not be your job to do that, but of the trillion dollar company whose stated mission literally is 'organizing world's information'. The inversion of roles is the problem.

bagacrap 6y ago

what is a "general mattress fact"? If you typed "mattress Wikipedia" you'd get a bunch of mattress history and facts, so it's not exactly hard to find what you're looking for, but it's probably the case that most people who type just "mattress" are looking to buy one. If that weren't true, why would Google show so many ads? It's not like showing a million ads is going to trick a seeker of general mattress facts into buying a mattress they don't need.

fragmede 6y ago
It's trivial to find "random fun mattress facts" by Googling for exactly that, but thanks to link and content aggregators, instead of flipping through channels on the tee-vee, we scroll for miles with our thumbs. Before commercial interests took over the web, it was full of weird and wonderful sites by hobby enthusiasts, built in their spare time that would have random weird facts and stories. For better or worse, that Internet is behind us now, so it's rare to come across that sort of treasure trove of a site. (To be clear, there's better and worse today, compared to the Internet of yore.) What's the case here, is that mattress store owners, in the conversion to online sales, have purchased, not only the adword for "mattress", but paid for all manner of SEO tricks and hackery in order to drive their site to the top of the results. Far in excess of what a hobbyist could or would bother with. It's a long shot, but the long tail of the Internet says that this has happened at least once. Someone was just poking around came across a random mattress myth or fact page, and found out that something they hate about their mattress isn't something they have to put up with. Whether that's "being tricked" into buying a mattress they didn't need, I won't say, but it still tickles an intellectually curious itch that I didn't even know I had, to find out that it’s illegal to purchase a mattress on Sundays in Washington. A single word query like "mattress" is vague and starting from first principles, we live under capitalism, assume everyone's trying to sell you something, and a search for "mattress" proves to be no exception. Same goes for if you search for "windows". Second link is how to get it (for $199).
anoncake 6y ago
> why would Google show so many ads Because that's their business?