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Are you suggesting that 2000d Google codebase would do a decent job against today's SEO?

by Arnt 2y ago

jgalt212 2y ago
I think the search and ad code base may not be explicitly co-mingled, but they are implicitly co-mingled. And return worse search results than the early 2000s code base.
- Arnt 2y ago
  Both are explicitly related to the web at large. Google sells ads on more than two million sites, and those mostly aim to be the kind of sites that feature in search results. I'd say that the two code bases are related, by virtue of operating on the same data structure. You remember the pagerank paper? It described how Google classifies each page on a scale from "something that links to good pages" to "informative page". Google and other search engines produces links to the latter. And since then, web site operators have had strong incentives to be on the "informative page" end of the range. Today I don't think the 2000s code can find a lot of pages of the former kind (well, outside Facebook). It produced very nice results back then. It was/is good code, but good results need more than just good code, it needs good input too.
ChocolateGod 2y ago
Today's SEO isn't the reason, it's simply more profitable for Google to give you terrible search results. It makes no financial sense for Google to give you good search results and get you off Google as soon as possible. Instead, if they make you spend more time on Google due to having to go through more crappy results, they can sell more ads. Most people won't change search engine and will stomach it. Until ChatGPT happened and can save you the pain of having to use Googles search engine.
griomnib 2y ago
The biggest reason SEO is profitable is because low quality sites run display ads. That is the lifeblood, and intrinsic motivation, for these sites to even exist. Google operates the largest display ads network. They literally *pay* websites for SEO spam, and take a very healthy cut off the top. I wish people would stop acting like Google has been in a noble battle against the spam sites, when those sites generate Google billions of dollars a year in revenue. The obvious question is, why would they ruin search for display? The answer is greed combined with hubris. They were able to double dip for years, but they killed the golden goose. Everybody with a brain knew this would happen when they bought Doubleclick, and it took longer than expected, but here we are.

Are you suggesting that 2000d Google codebase would do a decent job against today's SEO?

by Arnt 2y ago

Are you suggesting that 2000d Google codebase would do a decent job against today's SEO?

I think the search and ad code base may not be explicitly co-mingled, but they are implicitly co-mingled. And return worse search results than the early 2000s code base.

Arnt 2y ago
Both are explicitly related to the web at large. Google sells ads on more than two million sites, and those mostly aim to be the kind of sites that feature in search results. I'd say that the two code bases are related, by virtue of operating on the same data structure. You remember the pagerank paper? It described how Google classifies each page on a scale from "something that links to good pages" to "informative page". Google and other search engines produces links to the latter. And since then, web site operators have had strong incentives to be on the "informative page" end of the range. Today I don't think the 2000s code can find a lot of pages of the former kind (well, outside Facebook). It produced very nice results back then. It was/is good code, but good results need more than just good code, it needs good input too.

ChocolateGod 2y ago

Today's SEO isn't the reason, it's simply more profitable for Google to give you terrible search results. It makes no financial sense for Google to give you good search results and get you off Google as soon as possible. Instead, if they make you spend more time on Google due to having to go through more crappy results, they can sell more ads. Most people won't change search engine and will stomach it. Until ChatGPT happened and can save you the pain of having to use Googles search engine.

griomnib 2y ago

The biggest reason SEO is profitable is because low quality sites run display ads. That is the lifeblood, and intrinsic motivation, for these sites to even exist. Google operates the largest display ads network. They literally *pay* websites for SEO spam, and take a very healthy cut off the top. I wish people would stop acting like Google has been in a noble battle against the spam sites, when those sites generate Google billions of dollars a year in revenue. The obvious question is, why would they ruin search for display? The answer is greed combined with hubris. They were able to double dip for years, but they killed the golden goose. Everybody with a brain knew this would happen when they bought Doubleclick, and it took longer than expected, but here we are.