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That's great news. If there ever was an opportunity for newcomers to enter the search engine market, it is now. 15 years ago, the idea of competing with Google

by p-e-w 3y ago

That's great news. If there ever was an opportunity for newcomers to enter the search engine market, it is now. 15 years ago, the idea of competing with Google would have been laughable. Not only did they have all the money, their search engine was so incredibly good that it's hard to imagine what a new market entrant could have brought to the table. Today, Google's results are so hilariously bad that I have no doubt the majority of HN users could easily come up with ranking algorithms that would outperform Google's by a large margin. It's not that the problem is so difficult; the quality of results clearly indicates they aren't even trying. So please, go ahead and punish Google, Bing, and Co for what they have allowed to happen during the past decade or so.

parker_mountain 3y ago
> I have no doubt the majority of HN users could easily come up with ranking algorithms that would outperform Google's by a large margin Google is facing incredible adversaries whose only goal is to subvert their search. These adversaries are extremely skilled, motivated, and effective. You're probably right that many people can do better than Google, until you get enough traction that these adversaries pay attention to you. And then you'll have the exact same problem Google does. Don't overestimate yourself. Google/Bing are doing a pretty good job considering what they're facing, instead curse out the SEO teams who are subverting them. (And no, I'm not saying the major search players are without concern or condemnation, but "search quality" is not one of those issues for which they're directly responsible)
- rightbyte 3y ago
  > Google is facing incredible adversaries Are they? Google could manually remove the worst SEO sites from the index and like reduce the spam you get for dev queries with like 95%. It takes time to build up rank and like 10s to remove the site. There is an extension that does this client side for Firefox. Try it. (I don't remember the name. I only have it on desktop). The only explaintions are that Google is too dysfunctional to do anything or they are doing it on purpose to increase revenue. Otherwise there is no way the SEO would suddenly become this bad.
  - parker_mountain 3y ago
    > Are they? Google could manually remove the worst SEO sites from the index and like reduce the spam you get for dev queries with like 95%. Do you think they don't have a huge team doing just that? Easier said than done. > The only explaintions are that Google is too dysfunctional to do anything or they are doing it on purpose to increase revenue. Otherwise there is no way the SEO would suddenly become this bad. This is not based in reality.
    - rightbyte 3y ago
      > Do you think they don't have a huge team doing just that? Easier said than done. How can the Stackoverflow mirrors, that kinda hide that they are mirrors, rank so high then? If there was any team at Google doing manual review, the Google engineers would spam them with mails complaining that those site ruins their copy-pasta coding flow.

by p-e-w 3y ago

parker_mountain 3y ago

> I have no doubt the majority of HN users could easily come up with ranking algorithms that would outperform Google's by a large margin Google is facing incredible adversaries whose only goal is to subvert their search. These adversaries are extremely skilled, motivated, and effective. You're probably right that many people can do better than Google, until you get enough traction that these adversaries pay attention to you. And then you'll have the exact same problem Google does. Don't overestimate yourself. Google/Bing are doing a pretty good job considering what they're facing, instead curse out the SEO teams who are subverting them. (And no, I'm not saying the major search players are without concern or condemnation, but "search quality" is not one of those issues for which they're directly responsible)

rightbyte 3y ago
> Google is facing incredible adversaries Are they? Google could manually remove the worst SEO sites from the index and like reduce the spam you get for dev queries with like 95%. It takes time to build up rank and like 10s to remove the site. There is an extension that does this client side for Firefox. Try it. (I don't remember the name. I only have it on desktop). The only explaintions are that Google is too dysfunctional to do anything or they are doing it on purpose to increase revenue. Otherwise there is no way the SEO would suddenly become this bad.
- parker_mountain 3y ago
  > Are they? Google could manually remove the worst SEO sites from the index and like reduce the spam you get for dev queries with like 95%. Do you think they don't have a huge team doing just that? Easier said than done. > The only explaintions are that Google is too dysfunctional to do anything or they are doing it on purpose to increase revenue. Otherwise there is no way the SEO would suddenly become this bad. This is not based in reality.
  - rightbyte 3y ago
    > Do you think they don't have a huge team doing just that? Easier said than done. How can the Stackoverflow mirrors, that kinda hide that they are mirrors, rank so high then? If there was any team at Google doing manual review, the Google engineers would spam them with mails complaining that those site ruins their copy-pasta coding flow.