Comment by sanderjd
13 hours ago
But this is also why Google "sucks now". The thesis of these competitors was that Google got worse because of bad product decisions or implementation failures. But I found that to be a very questionable thesis from the start.
> The thesis of these competitors was that Google got worse because of bad product decisions or implementation failures.
But they did though. Google results got significantly worse after ads started lagging in revenue. So they hindered search and increased focus on the ad platform which shot up profits in 2019 I believe.
The web becoming more inhospitable is true. But Google has the tools, the data, and the engineers to wade through the bs and return good results. They just rather have bad results and good ads because that is where their bread is buttered.
A lot of competitors are working with a fraction of the budget, teams and data. So asking a small team to do proper AI detection, to return smaller indexed sites with high quality info over mass linked SEO abused hellscapes is very complicated, but asking Google to figure it out is proportional to their talent, expertise and resources.
It just not going to move their bottom line, so search is de prioritised compared to ads (some might even argue its made worse on purpose to make ads look even better)
This is the thesis, I understand the thesis, I remain skeptical of it. In my view, search sucks now primarily because there just isn't much worth searching for on the open web anymore. I think the "it's Google's fault" thesis is mostly an unwillingness to admit this.
You remain skeptical of something proven through leaked emails?
https://www.searchenginejournal.com/google-execs-scheme-to-i...
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I don't see why it can't be both. The web has less good content AND Google has altered their search results such that results are worse generally for us, but better for them and their bottom line.
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Google can both be worse because of the web results declining in quality and terrible product decisions. It is of course much easier to see one of the two, and make an alternative search interface possibly using different rating criteria. It just can’t solve the entire issue, because spam is also absolutely cheap to mass produce now.
Yes I agree. I don't begrudge competitors trying to do better at search at all. Maybe they'll succeed. I've just always been skeptical that they will be able to make significant progress on this problem, because I think the problem is ultimately garbage in garbage out.