5 ms·

yeah, i mean, this is hn, we’ve been collectively dissecting the “you’re not the customer” issue for years upon years. it doesn’t make it less of a shame. and

• ethbr1 3y ago
  IMHO, it's the monopoly aspect that really jumped the shark. Google as one among competitors (read: pre-Android/~2005) still had to be a useful enough search engine to attract users. Once their search share attained hegemony, user satisfaction deprioritized (relatively) and revenue was allowed to dominate. And thus, we now get a Google who has little interest in weeding out SEO'd spam. (And not as in 'tweaking their algorithm' -- as in fundamentally detecting and delisting all recipe-story porn and answer-mills)
  • kortilla 3y ago
    Google had the same issue pre-monopoly. Since its early history it’s been trying to show users what other users like. “Correctness” was never part of the equation because search engines that paid deference to authority all sucked. You can easily start a search engine using a different model. You’re going to struggle to compete with anything that prioritizes what users find popular.
    • ethbr1 3y ago
      My memory may be faulty, but ~2000 I remember results being more objectively useful from a user perspective. Versus competitors. Granted, it was a simpler problem then, given early web. But the slide since (in the face of revenue counter-incentives) feels at best like ambivalence about objective value to user.
      • BlueTemplar 3y ago
        Circa 2000 the Web was a lot less commercial and filled with ads (and trackers).