6 ms·

Google search is now practically shit. Instead of adapting it's rank so it links to high-quality content, it forces sites to adapt to its ranking model so they

by zb3 3y ago

Google search is now practically shit. Instead of adapting it's rank so it links to high-quality content, it forces sites to adapt to its ranking model so they have to produce meaningless crap.

sublinear 3y ago
I don't think word count is a new metric. It's just that documentation wasn't much of an ad revenue market in the past. Link juice also flows for backlinks. These sites definitely get heavily linked by blog spam.
- zb3 3y ago
  While I believe this is still a bad metric, I also believe that finally it should be up to the user to decide which sites they want ranked first - I'd definitely boost python.org while banning these content farms.
  - hedora 3y ago
    Some day I'm going to start paying these people: https://kagi.com https://kagi.com DuckDuckGo is a bit better than Google at avoiding content farms and semantic web spam, but I think it's mostly for the same reason Linux and MacOS used to have zero malware.
    - jstarfish 3y ago
      I hate shilling for the Russians but I've been very impressed with Yandex lately. It retains that early-2000s Google vibe, where there were still quirky independent sites to discover. Using it also surfaces just how much Google is censoring its own results on controversial topics.
      - throw13092023 3y ago
        Yandex is great, same as its image search. Props to the Russians heh.
    - l0b0 3y ago
      https://kagi.com/search?q=python+endswith https://kagi.com/search?q=python+endswith checks out: 1: docs.python.org › 3 › library › stdtypes.html 2: pandas.pydata.org › pandas-docs › stable › reference › api 3: This discussion! I've tried DDG and Brave for a few weeks each, and gone back to them once in a while when Google search has completely failed for things I know exist. They mostly have worse results than Google (purely in terms of relevance of the first page), and Google is trash now. I'll give Kagi a try for a few more days and see, but maybe the web has finally got to the point where paying for search is a useful strategy.
  - mminer237 3y ago
    Brave Search is enabling you to do that with Goggles: https://search.brave.com/help/goggles https://search.brave.com/help/goggles
    - rg111 3y ago
      I have used Brave search for some days. It's extremely bad. You can see for yourself.
      - mminer237 3y ago
        I use Brave Search pretty regularly. I'm not going to say it's better than Google, but in my experience, it's a not-too-distant second.
        rg111 3y ago
        For me, second, and in many cases, better is- DDG. As I mentioned in another comment, Phind and You Code have been quite good as well.

by zb3 3y ago

Google search is now practically shit. Instead of adapting it's rank so it links to high-quality content, it forces sites to adapt to its ranking model so they have to produce meaningless crap.

sublinear 3y ago

I don't think word count is a new metric. It's just that documentation wasn't much of an ad revenue market in the past. Link juice also flows for backlinks. These sites definitely get heavily linked by blog spam.

zb3 3y ago
While I believe this is still a bad metric, I also believe that finally it should be up to the user to decide which sites they want ranked first - I'd definitely boost python.org while banning these content farms.
- hedora 3y ago
  Some day I'm going to start paying these people: https://kagi.com https://kagi.com DuckDuckGo is a bit better than Google at avoiding content farms and semantic web spam, but I think it's mostly for the same reason Linux and MacOS used to have zero malware.
  - jstarfish 3y ago
    I hate shilling for the Russians but I've been very impressed with Yandex lately. It retains that early-2000s Google vibe, where there were still quirky independent sites to discover. Using it also surfaces just how much Google is censoring its own results on controversial topics.
    - throw13092023 3y ago
      Yandex is great, same as its image search. Props to the Russians heh.
  - l0b0 3y ago
    https://kagi.com/search?q=python+endswith https://kagi.com/search?q=python+endswith checks out: 1: docs.python.org › 3 › library › stdtypes.html 2: pandas.pydata.org › pandas-docs › stable › reference › api 3: This discussion! I've tried DDG and Brave for a few weeks each, and gone back to them once in a while when Google search has completely failed for things I know exist. They mostly have worse results than Google (purely in terms of relevance of the first page), and Google is trash now. I'll give Kagi a try for a few more days and see, but maybe the web has finally got to the point where paying for search is a useful strategy.
- mminer237 3y ago
  Brave Search is enabling you to do that with Goggles: https://search.brave.com/help/goggles https://search.brave.com/help/goggles
  - rg111 3y ago
    I have used Brave search for some days. It's extremely bad. You can see for yourself.
    - mminer237 3y ago
      I use Brave Search pretty regularly. I'm not going to say it's better than Google, but in my experience, it's a not-too-distant second.
      - rg111 3y ago
        For me, second, and in many cases, better is- DDG. As I mentioned in another comment, Phind and You Code have been quite good as well.