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The fundamental, unavoidable problem is that the cost of providing high-quality results on the long-tail of possible searches tends to grow faster than the reve
by joe_the_user 5y ago
The fundamental, unavoidable problem is that the cost of providing high-quality results on the long-tail of possible searches tends to grow faster than the revenues that can be earned from those increasingly rare, obscure, long-tail searches.
I think even two years ago, Google searches had far more depth and yet Google was quite profitable (then the searches were still biased but now stuff is simply gone). Sure, if someone looked at the marginal profitability of every single search result, it would look like what we're seeing. But there was a time when good indexing of stuff that didn't turn a profit by itself was done as a service to attract people to Google and/or to improve the Internet generally. That time has passed, clearly but it was a decision.
- cs702 5y agoI agree. In all likelihood, the decisions were made gradually to improve overall efficiency without losing search volume, but the unintended consequence was to degrade search quality, at first gradually in subtle ways, and then suddenly in very noticeable ways.[a] It's possible no one in the company's executive team has noticed the loss of quality. In fact, they may not think anything's wrong even now. [a] I'm paraphrasing Ernest Hemingway: https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/102579-how-did-you-go-bankrupt-two-ways-gradually-then-suddenly https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/102579-how-did-you-go-bankr...