3 ms·

How Google is killing our experience of the web and how we can avoid it

7 points by Major_Grooves 13y ago

source99 13y ago
This website is interesting but I find many flaws in their logic AND I think it will be almost impossible for them to pull it off. Of the many flaws, the one that stands out the most is that google's 4 line search result is useless(my summary of their viewpoint). Quote - "Like most of you, from the results above I can hardly tell if those websites are relevant to what I am looking for." If google's results were not the best people wouldn't use them. I will concede that google tailors the design of their results page so that it optimizes ad revenue but I won't concede that others have done a better job with different design. Bing has the exact same layout. While I do commend their effort I think it will be nearly impossible for them to compete from an algorithmic and CPU horsepower power point of view. Google has 15+ years of effort improving on their search algorithm and they have many billions of dollars worth of infrastructure that enable them to be the best at what they do. Could an open source(i.e. Linux) upstart come to compete against an entrenched market leader(i.e. Microsoft)? No. Linux didn't have the infrastructure overhead of making a world wide search engine.
- Gpapa 13y ago
  Snippets are a "tradition" used by coders since Search began. From a User point of view not very useful. Other Search Engines used them as well because they didnt innovate, they tried to imitate Yahoo and later Google (before that Natscape Navigator). For me the best example is the iPod click wheel. Who would have thought that the horizontal tape Recorder Buttons would ever be replaced...till Steve J. came and did it. Is the same with Search. Snippets are a tool of the past because the amjority of People think that if a corporation is doing it, it must be the right thing to do.The first ones to replace them will overtake Google and the rest. The CPU power is another Mythos. It can easily be distributed to Servers around the world. As a Commercial Company is this a nightmare. As a non Profit Network is another game. Google is interested in building User Profiles to sell them customised adds. Thats why they need gigantic storage space. We are not going down that path since we are not going to sell anything.We are rethinking Search from scratch without commercial thoughts in the back of our heads. And to our surprise we are finding many flaws. What we are proposing already existed but didnt survive because they were innovations ahead of their time. Now the Technology is here. Every day I am forced to use Windows 8, I curse the day Microsoft took out of Business all the better OS products in the 90ies. What worries me the most is the fact that the Linus Torvalds coder Generation is almost gone and one day we all will regret leting Google take over WWW.
dragonwriter 13y ago
While I agree that the the Google search experience could probably be better than it is, I find most of the proposed UI changes in the linked post to be absolutely horrible, especially the idea of "render the target page in a frame with scrollbars on the search results page so I can 'navigate around' the page while staying on the results page". Dear God, if I want to see the whole target page while keeping the SERP open, I'll just open the link in a new tab.
- Gpapa 13y ago
  The trend in webdesign is going toward parallax Scrolling. Simply because Scrolling is nicer and faster then klicken on menues. At HOSAPE Search, the scrollbars are only meant for you to scroll down the landing page (following the trend). Once you klick on the page itself (after knowing for sure it is the right Website you were after), the Website will open on a new browser window as usual. We are planning a prototype so People can test it live!
  - dragonwriter 13y ago
    > The trend in webdesign is going toward parallax Scrolling. Is it? AFAICT, the "infinite scroll" trend was all the rage a couple years ago, but has significantly moderated since then, with a number of properties that have adopted it reverting to more traditional designs, and a lot of the feeling that it was the right way to do web design in general rather than a technique that is useful and appropriate in certain narrow circumstances fading. > At HOSAPE Search, the scrollbars are only meant for you to scroll down the landing page If that is the case, you may want to work on clarifying the language and examples in your promotional materials -- the image with a website preview with scrollbars framed by the text: But there is even more to that. Not only Google could give us more information on the website, it could actually show a preview of the website in a window like this: [sample image] With the help of scroll bars you could maneuver through the website without leaving the Search page and save time with unnecessary clicks. Certainly gave me the impression that the scrollbars are used for navigating around the rendered preview of the target website. Part of the problem may be the ambiguous use of the phrase "the website" to refer both to the landing page and to the individual target pages.

7 points by Major_Grooves 13y ago

This website is interesting but I find many flaws in their logic AND I think it will be almost impossible for them to pull it off. Of the many flaws, the one that stands out the most is that google's 4 line search result is useless(my summary of their viewpoint). Quote - "Like most of you, from the results above I can hardly tell if those websites are relevant to what I am looking for." If google's results were not the best people wouldn't use them. I will concede that google tailors the design of their results page so that it optimizes ad revenue but I won't concede that others have done a better job with different design. Bing has the exact same layout. While I do commend their effort I think it will be nearly impossible for them to compete from an algorithmic and CPU horsepower power point of view. Google has 15+ years of effort improving on their search algorithm and they have many billions of dollars worth of infrastructure that enable them to be the best at what they do. Could an open source(i.e. Linux) upstart come to compete against an entrenched market leader(i.e. Microsoft)? No. Linux didn't have the infrastructure overhead of making a world wide search engine.

Gpapa 13y ago
Snippets are a "tradition" used by coders since Search began. From a User point of view not very useful. Other Search Engines used them as well because they didnt innovate, they tried to imitate Yahoo and later Google (before that Natscape Navigator). For me the best example is the iPod click wheel. Who would have thought that the horizontal tape Recorder Buttons would ever be replaced...till Steve J. came and did it. Is the same with Search. Snippets are a tool of the past because the amjority of People think that if a corporation is doing it, it must be the right thing to do.The first ones to replace them will overtake Google and the rest. The CPU power is another Mythos. It can easily be distributed to Servers around the world. As a Commercial Company is this a nightmare. As a non Profit Network is another game. Google is interested in building User Profiles to sell them customised adds. Thats why they need gigantic storage space. We are not going down that path since we are not going to sell anything.We are rethinking Search from scratch without commercial thoughts in the back of our heads. And to our surprise we are finding many flaws. What we are proposing already existed but didnt survive because they were innovations ahead of their time. Now the Technology is here. Every day I am forced to use Windows 8, I curse the day Microsoft took out of Business all the better OS products in the 90ies. What worries me the most is the fact that the Linus Torvalds coder Generation is almost gone and one day we all will regret leting Google take over WWW.

dragonwriter 13y ago

While I agree that the the Google search experience could probably be better than it is, I find most of the proposed UI changes in the linked post to be absolutely horrible, especially the idea of "render the target page in a frame with scrollbars on the search results page so I can 'navigate around' the page while staying on the results page". Dear God, if I want to see the whole target page while keeping the SERP open, I'll just open the link in a new tab.

Gpapa 13y ago
The trend in webdesign is going toward parallax Scrolling. Simply because Scrolling is nicer and faster then klicken on menues. At HOSAPE Search, the scrollbars are only meant for you to scroll down the landing page (following the trend). Once you klick on the page itself (after knowing for sure it is the right Website you were after), the Website will open on a new browser window as usual. We are planning a prototype so People can test it live!
- dragonwriter 13y ago
  > The trend in webdesign is going toward parallax Scrolling. Is it? AFAICT, the "infinite scroll" trend was all the rage a couple years ago, but has significantly moderated since then, with a number of properties that have adopted it reverting to more traditional designs, and a lot of the feeling that it was the right way to do web design in general rather than a technique that is useful and appropriate in certain narrow circumstances fading. > At HOSAPE Search, the scrollbars are only meant for you to scroll down the landing page If that is the case, you may want to work on clarifying the language and examples in your promotional materials -- the image with a website preview with scrollbars framed by the text: But there is even more to that. Not only Google could give us more information on the website, it could actually show a preview of the website in a window like this: [sample image] With the help of scroll bars you could maneuver through the website without leaving the Search page and save time with unnecessary clicks. Certainly gave me the impression that the scrollbars are used for navigating around the rendered preview of the target website. Part of the problem may be the ambiguous use of the phrase "the website" to refer both to the landing page and to the individual target pages.