UNLIMITED SHITTING ON GOOGLE THREAD :-D

[Triple Zero]

what do you think is causing googles results to be slipping?
is it the cat-and-mouse they have with SEOs that are screwing it up?

No, for some reason I believe they're really good at that and can usually manage to stay one step ahead, or at least not two steps behind

Besides, the results I get aren't that spammy.

It's more that they're catering for the best results to "simple" searches. You know, how often when you Google for something, you type two keywords and you're pretty sure it's the top result? I mean that's the easy stuff. That still works, I get fine results for queries like that.
And for people who are just looking for only those searches, the 99% retarded majority, all they gotta do is make sure the results aren't too spammy, because that'll get them viruses and scammed and it means they have to think and Google don't want that. If you optimize for those people, "Google Instant" and the Previews thing, and the search field autofocus crap, that's all really good for them, it makes Google even easier for them. They don't want cache links.

They want Google to "fix" their spelling mistakes, and they want Google to return pages that don't exactly contain the keywords they searched for, as long as they're roughly relevant.

That works excellent as long as you're looking for those typical two-keywords/first-hit queries.

But that's not Google-fu.

See I grew up with the Searchlores school of searching. The keywords, should all appear exactly as typed (in any order) in the search results. If you get too much spam, you add negative keywords, -mp3 -hotmail -myspace -free. If you don't get the right results, you try different combinations of different keywords. Synonyms, etc.

All that stuff doesn't work any longer. Synonyms? With Google "guessing" similar keywords for you, you're going to get the same results! And still don't find what you're looking for! Mostly the same with different combinations.

Searching "for phrases like this" doesn't really work anymore either. Unless you type "+for +phrases +like +this" but really, I shouldn't have to do that.

This is largely me guessing, btw. I do have some indications that they do in fact listen to the tech crowd (Matt Cutts posting on HN), except I haven't really seen them do anything with it.

And even though the other search engines don't run the majority of Internet servers worldwide, I dunno why Google needs that anyway, because the other ones, they always have been almost nearly quite as good as Google. And sometimes even give results that Google doesn't have!

Estimates of overlap between search engines range between 25% to 75% ... So that means 75% to 25% of other search engines is unique, or at least, not indexed by Google. And it's usually the obscure stuff, the old Internet stuff, the not-daily-updated RSS feed blog Facebook likeable stuff.

Which, when you're looking for an old Internet game of Trolling (see the thread in O:MF), is exactly what you want.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Yeah, google has become largely useless and frustrating these days. It sucks.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Unless you're shopping. What does that say about us.

[Doktor Howl]

Unless you're shopping. What does that say about us.

I'D LIKE SOME MORE THINGS, PLEASE.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Unless you're shopping. What does that say about us.

I'D LIKE SOME MORE THINGS, PLEASE.

MY HOUSE ISN'T QUITE FULL ENOUGH OF CRAP I DON'T NEED.

[Doktor Howl]

Unless you're shopping. What does that say about us.

I'D LIKE SOME MORE THINGS, PLEASE.

MY HOUSE ISN'T QUITE FULL ENOUGH OF CRAP I DON'T NEED.

Oh, you need it, all right.

Or the terrorists win.

[LMNO]

How do you know that I don't love America enough?


I LOOK AT THE NEXT FIFTY RESULTS.



Research, bitches, what?

[Cramulus]

what an effort intensive way to research! If you know what you're looking for, and you use the right bow (search engine) and the right arrow (search string), the info you need will always be right on top.

[Triple Zero]

what an effort intensive way to research! If you know what you're looking for, and you use the right bow (search engine) and the right arrow (search string), the info you need will always be right on top.

Not sure what you mean?

My point was, Google doesn't seem to work like that any more, hence me stepping out for different engines.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Google now does such a good job of guessing what I REALLY mean that I never get the results I want on the first try, and sometimes not the second or third, either.

LOOK FOR WHAT I SAID, NOT WHAT YOU THINK I PROBABLY MEAN, GOOGLE, YOU COCKFUCKER.

[Doktor Howl]

Google now does such a good job of guessing what I REALLY mean that I never get the results I want on the first try, and sometimes not the second or third, either.

LOOK FOR WHAT I SAID, NOT WHAT YOU THINK I PROBABLY MEAN, GOOGLE, YOU COCKFUCKER.

This.

If I say "Rick Perry" + "Gary North", I don't want to hear about Rick Perry and Gary Johnson.

FUCK'S SAKE.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Google now does such a good job of guessing what I REALLY mean that I never get the results I want on the first try, and sometimes not the second or third, either.

LOOK FOR WHAT I SAID, NOT WHAT YOU THINK I PROBABLY MEAN, GOOGLE, YOU COCKFUCKER.

This.

If I say "Rick Perry" + "Gary North", I don't want to hear about Rick Perry and Gary Johnson.

FUCK'S SAKE.

THERE IS HOWLING RAAAAAAAAGE.

[Telarus]

what an effort intensive way to research! If you know what you're looking for, and you use the right bow (search engine) and the right arrow (search string), the info you need will always be right on top.

Not sure what you mean?

My point was, Google doesn't seem to work like that any more, hence me stepping out for different engines.

I've been running into this as well. Thanks for the alternatives. I'd seen some buzz about DuckDuckGo, but haven't used it yet.

[Cramulus]

what an effort intensive way to research! If you know what you're looking for, and you use the right bow (search engine) and the right arrow (search string), the info you need will always be right on top.

Not sure what you mean?

My point was, Google doesn't seem to work like that any more, hence me stepping out for different engines.

That was responding to LMNO, who said that if his target isn't on top, he looks at the next 50 results


I'm just sayin -- if you find yourself on page 10, you probably didn't use a good search string.

[Triple Zero]

There can be fun stuff on page 10, though

One of the Searchlores tricks was the "yo-yo", which would skip to page 10 right away, to cut out the SEO crap

But in general, you're right.