5 ms·

I no longer see Google as a neutral "search engine" the way it used to be. Now it's just another company that owns and promotes certain types of content, no dif

I no longer see Google as a neutral "search engine" the way it used to be. Now it's just another company that owns and promotes certain types of content, no different from reddit. For some things Google has the best content, for some things Twitter or Reddit have the best content.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
maxwelldone 4y ago
Back in 2000s Google used to be the place for any type of search (IIRC). Now, I've been conditioned to use it only for specific use cases, mostly for convenience. Some examples include: 1. Anything programming related (searching for man pages, error codes etc) is straightforward. (I do have some UBO filters to exclude SO copycats) 2. Utility stuff like currency conversion, finding time in another city, weather etc. Where Google has really fallen behind is in multimedia search. Not sure if it's due to copyright issues or not but Bing and Yandex provide way better service in this regard. Not to mentions the "reddit" suffix I need to add to any search that even remotely calls for public opinion. In many cases, Google is just a shortcut to take me to the relevant subreddit.
- LegitShady 4y ago
  another thing seems to be prioritizing current news over past news which makes searching for old.articles youve read quite difficult.
- ufmace 4y ago
  Programming-related stuff seems to have gotten a lot worse in the last couple of years. Now most terms, at least for common things, return a ton of blogspam, when the official docs or SO are usually the best source.
photochemsyn 4y ago
I find one of the best ways to find interesting content on specific subjects using Google is now to start blocking all their top returns (a lot of SEO spam). This is somewhat tedious (lots of -site:seospam.com) and Google doesn't like automated queries. However, a few rounds of this often turns up interesting content down low in the search results. Just don't take what's on offer on page one of search results, basically. Where it's gotten really bad is on news searches as Google either now has some kind of shitlist of independent news sites that it won't allow to show op on, for example, site:youtube.com searches - or, it's filtered through a guest list. It's hard to tell which strategy they're using, but news is definitely being heavily filtered based on very dubious propaganda-smelling agendas.
- xvello 4y ago
  You might be interested in using uBlockOrigin and https://letsblock.it/filters/search-results https://letsblock.it/filters/search-results to easily block these domains. In addition to your own domain list, you can use the community-maintained SO / github / npm copycat lists.
dixego 4y ago
Google is an advertising company. It has been for a good while.
- big_blind 4y ago
  Yeah I use you.com and kagi.com. No advertising on either. Less SEO spam too it seems.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

maxwelldone 4y ago

Back in 2000s Google used to be the place for any type of search (IIRC). Now, I've been conditioned to use it only for specific use cases, mostly for convenience. Some examples include: 1. Anything programming related (searching for man pages, error codes etc) is straightforward. (I do have some UBO filters to exclude SO copycats) 2. Utility stuff like currency conversion, finding time in another city, weather etc. Where Google has really fallen behind is in multimedia search. Not sure if it's due to copyright issues or not but Bing and Yandex provide way better service in this regard. Not to mentions the "reddit" suffix I need to add to any search that even remotely calls for public opinion. In many cases, Google is just a shortcut to take me to the relevant subreddit.

LegitShady 4y ago
another thing seems to be prioritizing current news over past news which makes searching for old.articles youve read quite difficult.
ufmace 4y ago
Programming-related stuff seems to have gotten a lot worse in the last couple of years. Now most terms, at least for common things, return a ton of blogspam, when the official docs or SO are usually the best source.

photochemsyn 4y ago

I find one of the best ways to find interesting content on specific subjects using Google is now to start blocking all their top returns (a lot of SEO spam). This is somewhat tedious (lots of -site:seospam.com) and Google doesn't like automated queries. However, a few rounds of this often turns up interesting content down low in the search results. Just don't take what's on offer on page one of search results, basically. Where it's gotten really bad is on news searches as Google either now has some kind of shitlist of independent news sites that it won't allow to show op on, for example, site:youtube.com searches - or, it's filtered through a guest list. It's hard to tell which strategy they're using, but news is definitely being heavily filtered based on very dubious propaganda-smelling agendas.

xvello 4y ago
You might be interested in using uBlockOrigin and https://letsblock.it/filters/search-results https://letsblock.it/filters/search-results to easily block these domains. In addition to your own domain list, you can use the community-maintained SO / github / npm copycat lists.

dixego 4y ago

Google is an advertising company. It has been for a good while.

big_blind 4y ago
Yeah I use you.com and kagi.com. No advertising on either. Less SEO spam too it seems.