6 ms·

What is search these days but an ordered list of advertisements matching your keyword

cblconfederate 6y ago
wrong! they don't match I was just searching for "quill", a javascript editor. I clicked the first result without really looking (after all, i m searching name, right? ) - and it took me to some competing product called fro-something. I wasted my time, their money , yet google still made money.
- drivebycomment 6y ago
  I just tried search for "quill" in incognito, and I got quill.com as the first hit (both ads as well as organic result) - apparently there's a company called Quill Corporation (quill.com). It seems reasonable to return that as the first hit. quilljs.com is 5th hit on the first page. "quill javascript" has quilljs.com as the first hit. This seems reasonable. What's your suggestion on how to make this better ?
  - cblconfederate 6y ago
    just checked my history, my first result was "froalla", happened more than once (the query must have been "quill js" or "quill editor" cant remember -- it's an example of the infamous 'google® tax' - an obviously keyword-targeted ad)
  - eitland 6y ago
    Here's another one: https://www.google.com/search?safe=active&client=firefox-b-m&ei=Dcx-X7D5CoyorgT7q7vQAQ&q=%22express-http-proxy%22+%22logging%22&oq=%22express-http-proxy%22+%22logging%22&gs_lcp=CgZwc3ktYWIQAzIECAAQRzIECAAQRzIECAAQRzIECAAQRzIECAAQRzIECAAQRzIECAAQRzIECAAQR1AAWABgzH1oAHADeACAAQCIAQCSAQCYAQCqAQdnd3Mtd2l6yAEIwAEB&sclient=psy-ab&ved=0ahUKEwjws9CoyKTsAhUMlIsKHfvVDhoQ4dUDCAw&uact=5 https://www.google.com/search?safe=active&client=firefox-b-m... It is a search for "express-http-proxy" "logging" but at leat I got maybe one relevant result and a bunch of wildly unrelated ones, despite doublequotes.
    - IndexPointer 6y ago
      Do you have an example of a page that is a good result for that query?
      - eitland 6y ago
        There was one among the top 10 when I did the search. As for most of the rest of the first 10, null would have been a valid, more correct and generally better result! I actually wasted several minutes on one of them right away since I haven't still gotten into the habit of verifying every single Google result to se that it actually is what I asked for and not whatever filler Google decided to use this time. Not that it should be necessary, - they had this sorted back before 2010! Seriously: why can't Google or DDG get this right anymore?
- Spare_account 6y ago
  This sounds like exactly what the grandfather post (by wasdfff) was discussing. A competitor advertised their product based on the keywords you searched for. You didn't buy their product, but Google helped them get your gaze briefly. What is search but a list of adverts associated with your keywords?
  - cblconfederate 6y ago
    Google can do without this "google tax", and imho they should. It's unethical , and it's not like a competitor putting a sign next to yours. The user is literally searching for a brand and is instead driven to click another. At best the competitor should be an ad on the side in this case. Considering how (especially in mobiles) google is often used as a kind of DNS-autocorrect in the omnibox, this behavior is unethical on the same level as websites with popups. A rich company like google would not normally allow it to itself, they can easily dispense with such sleaziness. The fact that they can do it unpunished is indicative of a monopoly position.
arrosenberg 6y ago
What if search is that way because Google has a vested financial interest in the advertising business?
philosopher1234 6y ago
good god is this overdramatic. This whole thread is. Google is a good citizen, but people on hacker news just love a good story about tearing up big tech. How is society better off with google torn up? Arguments I expect and don't accept: 1. It allows alt search engine or alt browser to succeed. So what? The alt search engines and browsers are worse than the google ones. It doesn't benefit any actual people to have them rise up. 2. Google screwed my friend one time. Every single company (and person) on earth is guilty of this. One swallow does not a summer make. 3. Google is restricting this tech I like, or google is sometimes wrong about their bans. See (2) And so on. I haven't seen anything compelling in this thread, just a whole lot of hyperventilating. And to your point. No, search is not a wall of ads. But if you feel that way, literally change your search engine. It's easier than typing this comment you just posted.
- ricardo81 6y ago
  Google does have a great service, but calling them a 'good citizen' is a stretch, IMO. The events of celebritynetworth.com are a good example of why they've not been behaving as a good citizen (there is a thread about that on this forum). A good number of people have took up your suggestion and changed their search engine, DDG's traffic count continues to rise. The reality is that many users will use whatever is put in front of them, i.e. how many people use the URL bar of their browser for searches, or use a search toolbar for a specific URL? Google knows this well, hence their paying to be the default search engine choice and paying an amount that no other engine can match. Google's knows they are the best in class when it comes to general search, but to be sure they have been aggressive in ensuring that no one else gets a look in. The UK's CMA report estimates that an entrant to the market would require around £20 billion of capital to be a credible alternative, as in, a proper crawling search engine, not a meta search engine like DuckDuckGo. That's before paying the likes of Apple billions of dollars simply so that people will use "what is there". Having such a dominant position comes with responsibility, which is not solely Google's. The social networks along with Google are essentially the gateways to the web and how they present that information is important- and essentially only one point of view. Having room for more competition, choices, algorithms surely is a good thing.

wrong! they don't match I was just searching for "quill", a javascript editor. I clicked the first result without really looking (after all, i m searching name, right? ) - and it took me to some competing product called fro-something. I wasted my time, their money , yet google still made money.

drivebycomment 6y ago
I just tried search for "quill" in incognito, and I got quill.com as the first hit (both ads as well as organic result) - apparently there's a company called Quill Corporation (quill.com). It seems reasonable to return that as the first hit. quilljs.com is 5th hit on the first page. "quill javascript" has quilljs.com as the first hit. This seems reasonable. What's your suggestion on how to make this better ?
- cblconfederate 6y ago
  just checked my history, my first result was "froalla", happened more than once (the query must have been "quill js" or "quill editor" cant remember -- it's an example of the infamous 'google® tax' - an obviously keyword-targeted ad)
- eitland 6y ago
  Here's another one: https://www.google.com/search?safe=active&client=firefox-b-m&ei=Dcx-X7D5CoyorgT7q7vQAQ&q=%22express-http-proxy%22+%22logging%22&oq=%22express-http-proxy%22+%22logging%22&gs_lcp=CgZwc3ktYWIQAzIECAAQRzIECAAQRzIECAAQRzIECAAQRzIECAAQRzIECAAQRzIECAAQRzIECAAQR1AAWABgzH1oAHADeACAAQCIAQCSAQCYAQCqAQdnd3Mtd2l6yAEIwAEB&sclient=psy-ab&ved=0ahUKEwjws9CoyKTsAhUMlIsKHfvVDhoQ4dUDCAw&uact=5 https://www.google.com/search?safe=active&client=firefox-b-m... It is a search for "express-http-proxy" "logging" but at leat I got maybe one relevant result and a bunch of wildly unrelated ones, despite doublequotes.
  - IndexPointer 6y ago
    Do you have an example of a page that is a good result for that query?
    - eitland 6y ago
      There was one among the top 10 when I did the search. As for most of the rest of the first 10, null would have been a valid, more correct and generally better result! I actually wasted several minutes on one of them right away since I haven't still gotten into the habit of verifying every single Google result to se that it actually is what I asked for and not whatever filler Google decided to use this time. Not that it should be necessary, - they had this sorted back before 2010! Seriously: why can't Google or DDG get this right anymore?
Spare_account 6y ago
This sounds like exactly what the grandfather post (by wasdfff) was discussing. A competitor advertised their product based on the keywords you searched for. You didn't buy their product, but Google helped them get your gaze briefly. What is search but a list of adverts associated with your keywords?
- cblconfederate 6y ago
  Google can do without this "google tax", and imho they should. It's unethical , and it's not like a competitor putting a sign next to yours. The user is literally searching for a brand and is instead driven to click another. At best the competitor should be an ad on the side in this case. Considering how (especially in mobiles) google is often used as a kind of DNS-autocorrect in the omnibox, this behavior is unethical on the same level as websites with popups. A rich company like google would not normally allow it to itself, they can easily dispense with such sleaziness. The fact that they can do it unpunished is indicative of a monopoly position.

arrosenberg 6y ago

What if search is that way because Google has a vested financial interest in the advertising business?

philosopher1234 6y ago

good god is this overdramatic. This whole thread is. Google is a good citizen, but people on hacker news just love a good story about tearing up big tech. How is society better off with google torn up? Arguments I expect and don't accept: 1. It allows alt search engine or alt browser to succeed. So what? The alt search engines and browsers are worse than the google ones. It doesn't benefit any actual people to have them rise up. 2. Google screwed my friend one time. Every single company (and person) on earth is guilty of this. One swallow does not a summer make. 3. Google is restricting this tech I like, or google is sometimes wrong about their bans. See (2) And so on. I haven't seen anything compelling in this thread, just a whole lot of hyperventilating. And to your point. No, search is not a wall of ads. But if you feel that way, literally change your search engine. It's easier than typing this comment you just posted.

ricardo81 6y ago
Google does have a great service, but calling them a 'good citizen' is a stretch, IMO. The events of celebritynetworth.com are a good example of why they've not been behaving as a good citizen (there is a thread about that on this forum). A good number of people have took up your suggestion and changed their search engine, DDG's traffic count continues to rise. The reality is that many users will use whatever is put in front of them, i.e. how many people use the URL bar of their browser for searches, or use a search toolbar for a specific URL? Google knows this well, hence their paying to be the default search engine choice and paying an amount that no other engine can match. Google's knows they are the best in class when it comes to general search, but to be sure they have been aggressive in ensuring that no one else gets a look in. The UK's CMA report estimates that an entrant to the market would require around £20 billion of capital to be a credible alternative, as in, a proper crawling search engine, not a meta search engine like DuckDuckGo. That's before paying the likes of Apple billions of dollars simply so that people will use "what is there". Having such a dominant position comes with responsibility, which is not solely Google's. The social networks along with Google are essentially the gateways to the web and how they present that information is important- and essentially only one point of view. Having room for more competition, choices, algorithms surely is a good thing.