4 ms·

Are you saying the core Google search engineers don't know how the product they are building actually works?

by anonu 5y ago

Dma54rhs 5y ago
Why would it be surprising when the product is complex snd huge?
- anonu 5y ago
  I don't believe that a successful product operates in some magical realm where the operators just don't know how it works. I'm sure it's complex but it's probably very well laid out and managed complexity. An opaque system cannot be changed or improved upon. But yet, we see that Google Search changes every now and then with different methods of indexing and new features that bring relevant content to the top. Its evolving, which means that there are people who understand the system enough to effect change.
  - denton-scratch 5y ago
    I have never worked in a place where anyone knew everything about how the product worked. Google Search has been getting worse rapidly. I get more and more irrelevant ads crowding out the organic results, and more and more results that simply ignore my search terms. Nowadays I only use Google Search if I haven't found what I'm looking for by result-page-3 on DDG; and that usually doesn't help. I think the people at Goo that want search to be "the bestest" possible, are now in the passenger seat; the driver is obviously advertising. Wouldn't it be nice if "different methods of indexing and new features" really brought relevant content to the top? Instead, they seem to make relevant content disappear completely. Google could easily have the best search engine in the world, again, if they cared enough. But I guess money is more important; revenue from pure search: $0. Revenue from advertising: I dunno, $1billion PA?
spaetzleesser 5y ago
Is there anybody who knows all parts of Windows 10? I doubt it.
tsimionescu 5y ago
Such a system has many moving pieces. There is the core search algorithm itself. There are the indexing bots, and the amount of information they can produce. There is the compute infrastructure running all of this. There is the UI, with all sorts of tricks to make it ultra fast. There is the Ads integration. There will definitely be engineers who know one such system deeply, and maybe even a few who know two or three. But it is obvious that there can't be engineers knowing all of these things deeply, engineers who would be comfortable changing the UI or modifying the compute infra or changing the search algo params or the Ads code etc

Are you saying the core Google search engineers don't know how the product they are building actually works?

by anonu 5y ago

Are you saying the core Google search engineers don't know how the product they are building actually works?

Dma54rhs 5y ago

Why would it be surprising when the product is complex snd huge?

anonu 5y ago
I don't believe that a successful product operates in some magical realm where the operators just don't know how it works. I'm sure it's complex but it's probably very well laid out and managed complexity. An opaque system cannot be changed or improved upon. But yet, we see that Google Search changes every now and then with different methods of indexing and new features that bring relevant content to the top. Its evolving, which means that there are people who understand the system enough to effect change.
- denton-scratch 5y ago
  I have never worked in a place where anyone knew everything about how the product worked. Google Search has been getting worse rapidly. I get more and more irrelevant ads crowding out the organic results, and more and more results that simply ignore my search terms. Nowadays I only use Google Search if I haven't found what I'm looking for by result-page-3 on DDG; and that usually doesn't help. I think the people at Goo that want search to be "the bestest" possible, are now in the passenger seat; the driver is obviously advertising. Wouldn't it be nice if "different methods of indexing and new features" really brought relevant content to the top? Instead, they seem to make relevant content disappear completely. Google could easily have the best search engine in the world, again, if they cared enough. But I guess money is more important; revenue from pure search: $0. Revenue from advertising: I dunno, $1billion PA?

spaetzleesser 5y ago

Is there anybody who knows all parts of Windows 10? I doubt it.

tsimionescu 5y ago

Such a system has many moving pieces. There is the core search algorithm itself. There are the indexing bots, and the amount of information they can produce. There is the compute infrastructure running all of this. There is the UI, with all sorts of tricks to make it ultra fast. There is the Ads integration. There will definitely be engineers who know one such system deeply, and maybe even a few who know two or three. But it is obvious that there can't be engineers knowing all of these things deeply, engineers who would be comfortable changing the UI or modifying the compute infra or changing the search algo params or the Ads code etc