Maybe. I think it's less fuzzy - the ads back then were clearly ads and harder to mix up with search results. So even if Google had ads on top of search results

Maybe. I think it's less fuzzy - the ads back then were clearly ads and harder to mix up with search results. So even if Google had ads on top of search results then, it wasn't as misleading. Or rather: The statement looked valid then, but doesn't anymore. That's what people pick up on.