Google Search Decay, Internet Rot | Esoteric Internet

[@lv1543]

youtube search is also garbage now. i search a thing and i get literally like 6 relevant search results and the rest of the page is dedicated to nonsense or videos ive already seen. as if its actively trying to prevent me from searching new things

[@kp8923]

I've noticed this too, so bizarre. You'd think KZbin is incentivized to show me the neverending avalanche of content, but they seem to have decided well in advance what I should have practical access to.

[@jannikheidemann3805]

You get six? You lucky bastard!

[@crypticcorvid]

Literally just yesterday I tried looking up a song. 6 actual results, and then shock videos all the way down, occasionally interrupted by normal videos I've already watched. No matter how far I scroll, I swear it starts to loop the results.

[@angelainamarie9656]

I will search for a movie that I know I bought from KZbin and I will get a copy that I didn't purchase and an offer to buy it I have to go trawl through my own list to find it the search is absolutely broken it's completely worthless I've been using Bing

[@velevetyy]

cant search by oldest either anymore ugh

[@SixTough]

Have you noticed how bad youtube search is? It lists maybe 5 videos and then gives you "recommendations".

[@whogavehimafork]

And those "recommendations" are all just click bait and shock videos. Like I know what I'm looking for is a rather niche subject but I KNOW more than 6 people have uploaded videos on making indigo dye from indigo plants.

[@mitchellcouchman1444]

Google search engine is the same, says it finds millions of results but I think lois rossman did it where he scrolled and counted to find only 100 ish. Not just that google has be caught adding terms to their searches to get more ad revenue but I don't doubt they do the same for political reasons considering the recent Gemini fiasco

[@iknownot3336]

Right? I'm trying to see some cute cat and dog videos, not a cat in a blender animation. Pure bullshit

[@bump_versino]

if you use the search filters (i usually use the video length filter) those results dont show recommendations afaik

[@joekeith2819]

It's super apparent if you try to look up a video you made as a kid/ teenager with like 0 views. Even if you search every possible keyword, I can only get my old videos to come up by going through my account most of the time.

[@UnitSe7en]

One of the worst things is that your results are _personalised._ You tell someone what to search for and they can't find the webpage that's at the top for you. No longer delivering what you asked for, but what it thinks you want.

[@dominic.h.3363]

This was a contributing factor to losing my job, because part of my job as a freshly employed marketing administrator was to find articles from persons of interest to publish and cross-link as content. And sometimes coworkers would find in seconds what I didn't even have in my results at all (since they were longer in the business of doing this occupation so their search results were more relevant). And I've been using google in incognito mode, cross-referencing Bing, used search operators, used alternative spellings of keywords, searched in multiple languages if the person of interest had international acclaim or was a native of a non-English country etc., nothing worked to get an unbiased search result list.

[@quartz2999]

Yes! I hate this SO much.

[@nefwaenre]

And that last part is even more scary because it means, it's making the choices _for me. Against my wishes._ You can see a more blatant use of this in yt itself. You will never get the search result that you want. Instead, yt will throw at you all kinds of irrelevant things cuz it wants you to see those instead of your search query.

[@411Adil]

​@@dominic.h.3363Trust in the BISMILLAH 313 ¬

[@Hugsloth]

I get more freaked out by stories (mainly from the US) of people discussing topics verbally near their computer or phone, only to suddenly start getting ads specifically about that topic afterward. Do our devices really listen to us?

[@bren42069]

Yea. It's really sad. The internet is dying, everything is curated, censored, manipulated, monitized and sold out.

[@j.2512]

i think is not dying but dead already and we are only realizing how bad it is

[@indrickboreale7381]

Sadly it's our fault. We've used Facebook groups and subreddits, so we've stopped using separate forum websites. Online encyclopedias switched to Fandom hosting and regulations. Went from national chat websites to Messenger, WhatsApp and Discord. In short we gave too much power to tech corporations Edit: Granted, old websites were often ugly and their moderation could ban you, because they felt like it, no particular reason. So it's hard to blame us when I think about it

[@bonbonbonbons]

Enshittification

[@treysonmcgrady4750]

Capitalism

[@LeifMaelstrom]

​@@treysonmcgrady4750capturalism. Use new tech to capture customers with convenience. Pretend to be a charity by not charging customers and take investment dollars to pyramid scheme your project to keep moving. Make it the norm for your service to be free to discourage competition. Become so centralized that your failure would destroy central infrastructure so people have a vested interest in your continued existence and success. Centralize power. Take off the mask. That ain't capitalism. That ain't even corrupt or croney capitalism. That's just tyrannical grabs for authoritarian power by slightly more subtle means. So it's the same bastards as always. Elites with money and political power who want control more than they want wealth and happiness. The ivy League kids. The Old Sigmas.

[@RealDevastatia]

I searched for a KZbin channel by its exact name the other day, and KZbin search kept redirecting me to results for a more generic query that differed from what I typed in by one letter. The channel I wanted wasn't in those results. I finally had to dig into my browser history to find the channel I wanted.

[@SleepyCardinal-yx2lk]

That happens so much it’s not funny

[@mayqueen4780]

I find channels now by using bing or ddg to search for the channel name and get to them that way.

[@nameredacted1242]

I go mad when this happens. I am yelling at my computer, to give me the crap I read just yesterday, and Gurgle tries to tell me I am hallucinating.

[@STEVSGONE]

Let me guess it wasn't even a controversial Channel either. Yes I've seen it.

[@SlavTiger]

I had the same issue and searched for it from a different search engine and immediately found a link to it. Not visable within youtube, visable on bing and duckduckgo

[@vonbruhh]

man I miss the old web. Forums and blogs about anything you would like to know about, no censorship, no centralization of information on mainstream sites and social networks. Everything was natural and organic.

[@davelowe1977]

This.

[@xXx_Regulus_xXx]

you can still make your own websites, it's possible I'm probably going to buy the url of my name and make a site that's like an interactive resume

[@haganame1240]

​@@xXx_Regulus_xXx I've bought domain and static page hosting for myself and will make simple html site. I love old internet and miss it greatly.

[@davelowe1977]

@@xXx_Regulus_xXx I host about 20 websites and servers. It's an interesting hobby.

[@larsonfamilyhouse]

No fake reviews, no fake knockoffs posing as the real deal

[@hope-cat4894]

I hate that they force trending topics onto you unless you log in and choose to opt out of them. I don't like the fear mongering those trending topics can create, and I don't feel like being distracted anymore than I already am on a day-to-day basis.

[@melody3741]

And the non-fearmongering trending topics are all amateur oversexualized garbage from india and boomers who have literally no taste

[@drifter402]

Even Windows itself does it now. You'll be at work and they're shoving propaganda in your face. It's like a hammer talking at you about republicans

[@literallyjustgrass]

​@@drifter402the reason you're seeing political articles is because the algorithm knows that's something youre likely to engage with.

[@atticusherodes6648]

@drifter402 even on my desktop they give me propaganda, I am completely Linux now I used my windows lap top 3 times in the last 4 months I just mostly use it as a external hard drive for windows files

[@JimMilton-ej6zi]

@@literallyjustgrass nah it's because they want to force their political agenda on you or get you hooked on their sources that misconstrued information. KZbin will straight up have a "breaking news" section any time something happens that can push their own bias but hide it the second it's something they don't want people to see. The covid stuff was a big one, they pushed those videos out weekly in your face, and they always had dislikes and comments that called them out on their bs lol

[@melody3741]

The worst problem I’m seeing is google’s complete inability to accept “weird” searches. It takes what people search for most often and gets perfect results for that, then any slight modification and you get NOTHING. Blue chair - you get tons of blue chairs of every kind Red chair - still blue chairs chair that is not blue - blue chairs Like that

[@TomyDayos]

It would be very easy to find something with the exacly words, if google didnt changed the exacly words, I alreandy seen a video about how google change for example the quote "local restaurants" is changed to multiple names of brand restaurants, so your result will have a mac donalds or other big name and not the small restaurant right next to you.

[@TheAweDude1]

That's just you trying to inject natural language into a search engine. If you want to find exclude a certain type of search result, use boolean operators. For example, to find non-blue chairs, use the term "chair -blue". Boolean operators have been in use in search engines since at least 2001 (oh, and by the way, this factoid took me literally 2 minutes to find).

[@__Brandon__]

"Chair that is not blue" Gets filtered into "Chair Blue" If you want not blue you need to write "Chair NOT Blue" Look up stop words, words like that, is, the, a, and, or, not, ... All get removed before the search starts

[@stackflow343]

Exactly. Intent interpretation should be left to AI where you're expected to speak in contextual sentences. Where inference makes sense and works. When it comes to search engines, the last thing it should do is decide intent and modify your query. People search by keyword %90 of the time, they expect results with exactly the terms they input or deny. Not a reimagined version of it.

[@robertbruce7686]

😂😂.. waìt...

[@PolyesterMoustache]

I remember in like 2008 you could verbatim search on google and find exactly what you were after. Even like a specific youtube comment

[@electron6825]

Damn, I totally forgot about being able to find specific comments! It's insane and disturbing how degraded this has become

[@fennecfoxfanatic]

mannnnn i miss being able to search through youtube comments.

[@isidoreaerys8745]

YES! Putting things in quotes doesn’t even work now. It’s like the search engine doesn’t even bother to look for the the exact phrase you’re looking for.

[@fredericgagnon]

I did a quick test and tried to find your exact comment using various search engines. I put the first sentence in quotes and hit search. Bing, Brave, Yandex and Startpage found nothing and gave up (brave suggesting me other search engines and bing sending me to their AI tool). Mojeek, Google, QWANT and Presearch also found nothing but gave me search results without quotes. Funny thing on the Google and Presearch search results the same 2 hacker new posts showed up near the top. One from 2011 talking about Google introducing verbatim searches and one from 2022 stating that verbatim searches no longer work. Both were next to each other. And putting the search string right here in youtube got me nothing but my recommendations.

[@fauxre]

@hexyellow9873Hi, could you share where in the top right this is located, or what it’s called? Thanks.

[@thebreakfastmenu]

Google and by extension KZbin's search functions have been so bad the last couple years that it aggravates me at least once a day when I can't find what I'm looking for, even if I type in exactly what it is I'm searching. KZbin's music search is especially terrible. Even when doing some online shopping, I get results from counterfeit products half the time before I get a result for the genuine thing I'm looking to buy. And that's assuming the "genuine product" isn't on some sketchy website. And the ads and sponsored content is atrocious, irrelevant, and often contains websites and products and links that have malware or are outright scams. On mobile, Google can't ever get my location right. It can be hours away, or the next town over. But I'd venture a guess that at least 99% of my searches from mobile are in the wrong town. Sometimes state. So I often don't click on things after a search because Google just doesn't give me what I search for.

[@treelineresearch3387]

I've used DuckDuckGo as my default engine since the late 00s because it has this nice feature where it accepts !command modifiers to direct a search. For the first several years most of my searches were "!g something", which just tells DDG to send the "something" search to google. In more recent years I've dropped the !g because DDG's default search results, while still being not all that great, are now often better than Google's. I also find myself using Yan dex and Bai du a lot more, even with Baidu having a difficult language barrier and the CN web being a generally strange place where people want to charge you like a nickle to download something from a forum.

[@danf7411]

It's an effect of their anti disinformation efforts and artificial inflation of preferred results. Ever since they had that KZbin scandal with conspiracies and right wing pipeline. Ever since then they give preference to corporate interests and news agencies over users. All their auto completes are biased and they definitely have preferred outlets. That's one thing but it bled out into everything non conspiracy or political related. The whole engine got worse over time because of that imo

[@dallas7077]

Just last night I searched an article name, the author of the article, and the publication, and it said "zero results." Searched the exact same thing on duckduckgo and immediately found it.

[@stalemateib3600]

These problems with KZbin started around 2017. They are a byproduct of KZbin wanting to become "TV 2.0" and also Google's desire to fix the holes that allowed Trump to get so popular on KZbin in the 2016 election.

[@placeholder3853]

We couldn't find that very specific thing you searched for although it most definitely exists on this website as you even remember watching it before but we just don't feel like showing it to you now, so here's Mr. Beast!

[@KenderGuy]

My favorite is when I'm looking up a technical issue, and every answer is 8+ years out of date so when I filter for "this year" (not last year, or 365 days, so early in the year you gotta specify the month of last year) the results get completely randomized. It's like, because I'm not part of the herd asking the same question, my results are intentionally obfuscated So instead I join a Linux Discord server, or other troubleshooting community, or simply give up and search Reddit instead, and I hate Reddit

[@KenderGuy]

Also fun fact: Ctrl+backspace deletes everything in the comment field, here on KZbin Not the word, everything. There better be a good fucking reason to be taking over basic OS functionality. But there isn't, this is a "feature" that Google thinks someone might want, because nobody ever makes a typo and wants to re-type that word. I hope those geniuses in suits go bankrupt soon so I can see what a post-Google internet may look like. I hope it's complex and true to the nature of the web, rather than some streamlined sponsored bullshit. Same with Windows, I want to understand my shit, and use it directly, not interact with some streamlined sponsored middleman BS that pretends it's the best around, while shoving my PC full of bloatware, spyware, and not even allowing me full access to the settings, as if I didn't build my own PC with my own two hands. Macrohard shouldn't get to make choices about my PC, or try to shove Windows 11 down my throat every time I turn it on. But it does, and Linux will never be the standard, because Windows is standard, and nobody supports Linux (even when adding support is as simple as checking a box in Unity, especially if EAC is used). But it'll be at least a decade before Google somehow fucks themselves over enough to go out of business. Maybe longer, I can't see the future.

[@markm0000]

This is with all things technical not just office software. I was trying to get a very expensive sound mixer fixed and all the results were from before the pandemic. I got a feeling smart people are just refusing to share their information freely on the internet to keep their small niche all to themselves. That’s the huge difference between web 2 and web 3. Centralization got rid of small useful sites and replaced them with mega forums and social media. Then useful information that took up drive space and isn’t making anyone profit was deleted. All that’s left is useless clickbait and poor quality sources. There has to be a better search. I think Discord should give people the option of sharing solutions to a kind of chat style blog that can be indexed.

[@JorgetePanete]

[deleted]

[@TheGhostFart]

@@JorgetePanete yeah that is the absolute worst

[@SomnusLucisCaelum]

I tried looking up a spare part for a car and how to install it. It's not even an ancient car but one from early 2000s. It gave me results for OTHER car of the same brand that's popular right now because of course the ads above were autozone and a local store chain trying sell me the spare part for the new car. All other results below had nothing to do with the search except talking Nissan. Copilot AI gave me the result (with useful reference links Google never even touched) in like three seconds

[@migoreng7789]

the death of blogs really is sad to me, i used to be active in niche communities back in late 2000s, very early 2010s and when twitter became more popular, i already noticed a shift in clicks - people prefered to just read tweets from a person vs their longer blog posts. tumblr still is going strong but for longest time it was very graphics oriented (gifs, photo edits etc) but now it's way more about memes and long form posts are there but not really on the forefront. tumblr's search engine is terrible and makes finding useful posts so hard... like there was a post about alternate search engines that pull out results like hobby blogs from 2007 that i can't find 💀

[@cloudycolacorp]

I really miss blogs, I took them for granted when they were around.

[@overlordofthepies]

I think the post you saw was referring to the Marginalia search engine.

[@GabrielGBjas]

I want to use tumblr so hard but can't find my way around something interesting lol

[@noneyabiznazz]

Try searching for a recipe for old times sake then... you cannot get s recipe without a 10 page blog of mostly filler brainless repeated on every recipe regardless of website

[@xx0874]

wiby search engine is good

[@userequaltoNull]

I barely even use Google anymore, I find that asking questions even in small forums gets more, better, and faster results.

[@Pseudiom]

So true.

[@dxtrum]

Finding these small forums isn't always easy tho

[@RoofusRoof19]

Can you give a list? Personally I've always been into the idea of smaller forums but I could never really find them.

[@connorperrett9559]

Google singlehandedly destroyed asking other people for advice then singlehandedly brought it back by ruining itself.

[@909crime]

​@@RoofusRoof19you'll have better luck finding a forum based around a nieche topic you're already interested in. what are your intrests?

[@askhowiknow5527]

Google doesn’t do what it used to do. I can’t even force keywords anymore. It arbitrarily removes them from the query for some reason and no amount of plus signs or quotes can get around it.

[@ajaxbird2348]

I recommend DuckDuckGo as a search engine

[@Keys879]

Page and Brin believe themselves arbiters of the age of information. They believe it is their right and only theirs to tell people what they can and cannot know, speak, hear, or see. It's incredibly dangerous for the World.

[@Jenna_Talia]

What I hate is it still uses keywords in searches, that still works, but it'll bombard you with results saying "Missing [keyword], must contain [keyword]"

[@vo7414]

The + sign got deprecated back when Google was trying to make Google+ a thing unfortunately.

[@Avvy89]

With the way Reddit is also curating their content, soon adding +Reddit to the search query would be useless as well

[@dergonak]

I Googled "search with plus" and the 2nd result was an article titled Google Removes The + Search Command from Oct 24, 2011.

[@Pseudiom]

It is probably just adding the "Reddit" that makes it pull up Reddit results then. The current search must think the + is operationally useless. Thanks Google!

[@CAMSLAYER13]

I already get dozens of old useless reddit posts with every search. It sucks

[@j.2512]

Reddit is the internet's "pravda". Its astroturfed to hell by propaganda and corporate shilling

[@stevem815]

It seems like you mostly get some reddit post from 9yrs, 3 comments. It's almost never helpful. And it also means having to look at reddit, which is never a good thing.

[@stackflow343]

>search with quotes >get results that literally say they don't contain the quoted text THEN WHY ARE YOU SHOWING ME FDJGHSDK

[@nameredacted1242]

Worse yet, lots of Gurgle help page still explain how to use " " and +, but Gurgle search completely ignores these now.

[@alexandredatlanza5914]

You damn right ! That so ridiculous !

[@jhoughjr1]

I remember the Google of 98. It was so great.

[@nameredacted1242]

@@jhoughjr1 And I DON'T remember Gurgle being there in 1998... I have a conspiracy theory that the Internet did not exist prior to Y2K. My parents bought a Compaq PC with AMD K6 processor, Windows 98SE, 17" CRT, and we had no Internet. I went to the local library to get onto Yahao chat. Altavista was there, Yahao search and chat was there, but it was several years before we even got dialup.

[@ilikecats1234h]

>muh heckin arrow

[@LividImp]

Googles search results are absolutely at an all time low. I'm old enough that I was a web developer before Google even existed. In the late 90s Yahoo was in the same position that Google is today. Yahoo's search had been the best, but was quickly rendered useless by the SEO jackals. When Google came along with a better search algorithm, it killed Yahoo over the course of just a few years. Yahoo was (much like Google now) too arrogant to see themselves losing market to a tiny upstart that advertised on SF's NPR station. Google's usurper isn't here yet, but when it comes Google is going to fall as hard as Yahoo did. Because much like Yahoo they are ignoring the problem.

[@Astolfo2001]

Talk about becoming the very thing you've sworn to destroy Thank Arceus for SearX and SearXNG instances though.

[@chriskucia8348]

Been on the web as long as you. One of the things I wonder is if it's even possible for a real competitor to emerge. I haven't kept up on search engines, but there was a time when each one had it's own branded crawler, and a real issue back then was sites could and did block them. I'm guessing that by now most sites have opened themselves to google's crawler or crawler-equivalent, but I wonder if a real competitor could emerge without being blocked. Many of the other "competing" engines appear to just be regurgitating Google results with a better front-end to mediocre effect.

[@atticusherodes6648]

@chriskucia8348 maybe if some one goes old school and rolls there own instead of paying Google and Bing to search theirs

[@atticusherodes6648]

But goggles got circular funnels starting with Android where it will always point to itself and things it owns are choice of phones was removed around 2011, now all phones are google and Google some how manages to get away with breaking laws in every country and violating trade rules as long as the pay that 1 dollar fine.

[@LividImp]

@@atticusherodes6648 That's 100% what has to happen, for no other reason than to thwart the SEO jackals long enough to get established. Sure it would be a lot harder to do in 2024 instead of 1999, but the potential pay out would be insane by comparison. Billions of dollars today instead of millions in the 90s. It might have to be done with some kind of huge company backing the project, but Microsoft as proved time and time again they don't innovate, they shrewdly imitate. So Bing, for as much as it has improved over the years, is a non-starter. And it will take more than a hype-man type like Musk or Jobs. It will take some real under-the-hood talent to completely change it up.

[@SiliconChipCookie]

I miss the web surfing days of yore. It was a fun experience as a kid. Now we just go where people are, to the road heavily trodden by. Back then, you can discover different things and curiously strange things. Now it’s all just billboards you see while driving through the finitely yet vast deserts of the internet.

[@videocrowsnest5251]

Had we been adults back then, I wonder would that fun experience have been present? Especially knowing in hindsight that the old internet was very infested with pretty hateful stuff too. Not to mention malware that could easily destroy our (in this thought example) self paid, expensive computers. The only difference being as a kid it flew over one's head. Vise versa - Being an adult now, I wonder what it is like being a kid in the current internet landscape? Does it come with the new version of that mysterious, adventurous feeling? These are pretty good questions I think to ponder on, because nostalgia can be an easy trap to fall into. Especially factoring in that back then, as kids, we were obviously ignorant and didn't recognize the present nasty bits. I'd also wonder on that perhaps a part of the allure of the old internet was that not everyone was online. I'll use a really weird fantastical imaginative example to highlight what I mean: casting magic. Fantastic if one had this ability, aye? Well, would it be at all special if everyone could cast magic? It would in time become merely just another practiced, exploited, streamlined, corporatized, ranked, measured, regulated, law bound, and in every possible way mundane thing. I personally think this is a big part of why the modern internet can feel dry. It's not special to be online. It's not a secret adventure land oasis for the few tech-savvy or curious enough sorts to prod around. Just a very powerful communication tool (which is what the internet is and was meant to be) that everyone ought to have the right to use.

[@blindedjourneyman]

​@@videocrowsnest5251ive asked my sibs this question frequently to saddening answers my little bro the most avid of the 3 prefers the chans, discord, and reddit. I'm rolling about the fact that 4chan is still relevant these days yet no newgrounds kongregate or armor games ;-; no tumbler or small sites. tldr: the magic is gone least to the tiny sample whom I can ask

[@milkymilk53]

​@@videocrowsnest5251a very simple comparison. The Internet in early 90s/00s was a way to expand our minds, find things we didn't know about. Research things we had heard about. The Internet now is more of a means to constrict our minds into not finding out about things higher bodies don't like

[@videocrowsnest5251]

​@@milkymilk53 I am unsure about that. I think if anything I personally stumble into way more food for thought now than I've ever done before. Again, the bar is set higher being an adult now. Mileages may vary, of course. But in general, it feels way easier now than it ever did as a kid: where the bar was again much lower. I don't think there is a need for conspiratorial thinking. It's pretty obvious corporations are greedy dumpster fires and are even at their best loathsome entities. But I tend to think they are rather focused on their prime imperative - making money - over wasting time on scheming to constrict people's minds. Who many times do a fine enough job of that on their own anyway. As, after all: a series of highly problematic algorithms didn't make many people turn horrible just on their own. That seed was always there to begin with. Just was easier to ignore before it got cultivated by algorithmic meddling, giving them a sufficient echo chamber for growth space. Radicalized people were always predisposed to the things they now adamantly spout. The root cause of this kind of thing, if you will, is found within them themselves. But of course, it got a little help from corporations with no integrity or care. As it turns out, not a whole lot of people are very pleasant. Which is, and has always been, how things are. Same for selfish people. Who there will always be a large amount of, and whom have always been here. Just easier to ignore before the internet made the bubbles pop one by one. Oh, and whatever happens on the bleeping social media sites like Facebook or X is so visible that I am astonished anyone lingers on those still. They are such radiant fecal matter dumpster fires that I do not understand why people remain on sites that continue to not just exploit them with maximum impute, but also punch them continuously in the face. I cannot imagine a worse way to spend my time (well, ok, Reddit and a certain set of image boards would be way worse) than being on either of those glorified waste disposal units having my mental health battered to pieces and a constant inferno of rage making everyone angry, distrustful, and argumentative to the last.

[@Necroskull388]

Man this brings me back to when I was google searching "naruto online game free" and finding a bunch of small, weird projects to play. It's how I got into BYOND for as long as that lasted.

[@BlockBusterHomeVideo]

I compulsivley google everything and have for years, I just cannot stand not knowing the answer to a question, but ive noticed a SHARP decline, and especially the last 6 months have felt like its got dementia, most searches dont even almost answer my question until i repeat the key words a few times, on the 23rd of December 2023 I googled "gunshot slang" but couldnt even locate a single result in the spam but "gunshot slang slang slang slang" delivered on the first result

[@BlockBusterHomeVideo]

i gotta do this often "freshwater fish that sting" exclusively saltwater results "fresh water fish sting lake fresh fresh water lake fish sting" gave results

[@user-dnf83n0s8sg9u]

Thanks for sharing this, what a fcking mess

[@soupstoreclothing]

genuinely thank you for sharing this. it sucks we have to do this but at least there's some sort of solution to getting the results we want.

[@glameow12345]

I noticed this as well, it feels almost impossible to get any actual answers now on google

[@Aryasvitkona]

can't wait till search engines fragment so hard that someone makes a search engine to search which search engine is the best for your question

[@Cavi587]

Searx is already a thing. A meta search engine.

[@pinktea3221]

I just wanted to know nutritional content of potatoes and it gave me like 4 POTATO ONLINE SHOPS before actual information...

[@tinfoilhomer909]

Google still refuses to tell me how Americans measure pouch tobacco... ounces? grams? who know!

[@Apost0345]

@@tinfoilhomer909If by pouch tobacco you mean rolling tobacco then its in oz, if you mean snus, then I have no idea (i only checked two websites tho). I’m european so i have no idea, my bet would be grams tho, as those are pretty small amounts.

[@angrydachshund]

Here, I will help you: POTATO, noun, root vegetable. Ingredients: Potatoes. Nutritional breakdown: Starch, 98%; funny root eyes, 1%; dirt, 1%. You're welcome.

[@ThatBugBehindYou]

It used to be so easy to find reference images and information, the world wide web is feeling like a small gated community more and more by the day and no one cares because the majority of users switched to social media monsters as of 2014/15

[@Pearl-Slug]

I'm glad to see someone talking about this. It's something I started to notice a couple of years ago. In particular, finding old custom content for any of the Sims games besides the most recent one (The Sims 4) is an absolute nightmare. You're practically forced to start a WCIF thread on Mod the Sims or the like. With regards to Google images... you'll get tons of images from Pinterest (low res copies) but god forbid they actually serve you the original source where those Pinterest copies came from. There's also the fact that you used to be able to search for images by some pretty specific sizes, but now it's just a vague small, medium, and large. If you somehow did find the image you were looking for, you used to be able open the image url directly from the search results... now it forces you to go to the page where the image may or may not actually be. I also dislike the state of their reverse image search now. It can't even really be called that any more, it's more of a "similar image search" now. This comment ended up longer than I intended, oops.

[@milkymilk53]

I've been with you about Google images for the last few years. It is beyond useless now. Especially the part where you USED to be able to just click the image and be sent to the images URL. And now you get a generic domain that may or may not actually have the image. Or if you do get to the image you clicked on you are no longer able to save the image or anything. Hell you can't even screenshot Google images on mobile anymore. So I'm left wondering what is the point of it these days

[@flower-ld5id]

​@@milkymilk53you often have to press f12 and find the URL

[@HallsteinI]

I've had to switch away from Google search, it's worthless for... almost everything.

[@extremelynormalperson]

As a graphic designer and someone who has always just liked to hoard images - Google image search is nearly useless at this point. Unless you're using it to get frustrated.

[@carlosdasilva2409]

Man, this. You'd reverse search an image that you deliberately took from a forum and Google is unlikely to redirect you to the forum. It will instead show "similar" crap or just say that it couldn't find the image. Also, forget about finding anything with "copyright" (if you're searching say...an anime or game by a picture, you'll be hit with the "couldn't find the image" prompt more often than not)

[@Elias___]

It's crazy how the advertising industry continues to make the worst choices for their success and humanity. Everyone hates ads everyone avoid ads yet the advertisers double down and make ads worse for everyone and everything.

[@innapropriatehandle]

this is why I don't feel bad using Ublock Origin

[@superlou2012]

Fauxconomy

[@adamwatson2350]

the psychological warfare arm of consumerism

[@anomalocarisgaming8205]

Lmao

[@bazookaman1353]

It may not work for humans but it works for ants.

[@Fourtune1]

KZbin is bad too. They show completely irrelevant videos they “suggest” and don’t show videos older than 2 years old.

[@STEVSGONE]

I actually have an older phone and I can through keyword search get older stuff than 2 years thanks for the information. It will help me make a life-altering decision that I must make sometime today.

[@yourunemployedfriendat2pm]

Ive gotten really old videos recommended to me, it really depends on what you watch

[@1cool]

you can use "before:[insert year here]" and i think there is also "year:[insert year here]" to search for older videos, for example "before:2015"

[@cordlefhrichter1520]

​@@STEVSGONE What decision did you end up making?

[@animeloveer97]

youtube is owned by google so it doesnt suprise me

[@ricardomiles2957]

14:31 That. That's what happening. I was about to make a comment about. It doesn't seem the quality declined, but that the presentation changed, and now i have the word for it. It's sanitized. There always were trash results, and the ads are actually way less invasive compared to the last decade. The only thing i miss is the freedom to look up obscure results, going to the search page 25 and finding a blog from the 90's that by coincidence has rhe word i searched.

[@rabbitcreative]

> i have the word for it. It's sanitized. Censored works, too.

[@homunculusballs]

​@@rabbitcreative by who bro

[@ricardomiles2957]

@@rabbitcreative censoring implies only in removing content. The algorithm and new layouts don't fit on that

[@Michael-lu2tz]

@@homunculusballsoy vey

[@0xAA55]

@@homunculusballs “censored by who?” By google? What?

[@matthewcrockett288]

I have no respect for anyone doing SEO, its ruining search results. Google was my best tool for IT support, but I can't even use it anymore. I've been looking for articles or blogs on building a PC (since the last time I built one was prior to the pandemic), and I'm finding old articles from more than a decade ago, with meh results.

[@JorgetePanete]

it's*

[@JimMilton-ej6zi]

Google: "You want to find out how to fix a paper jam in the HP officejet 2400? Here, we'll show you links to buy the HP officejer 2400, that's what you clearly wanted." Me: *silently raging*

[@Ozzianman]

Dont blame the players, blame the game. I do some SEO, and I hate it.

[@maelstrom2313]

SEO isn't the problem, it's SEO fraud. I've only ever put relevant search information into my sites SEO. Sites that use fraudulent SEO should be deranked by search algorithms. Users should be able to provide feedback on whether the results match their search.

[@JorgetePanete]

@@maelstrom2313 and so was feedback fraud born

[@StayMadNobodycares]

Google puts 5 ads before the actual results they cater to paid promotions and the highest bidder, the results get you nowhere these days, 2008-2012 ish seems like it's peak give or take my rough estimate and foggy memory. It would seem that Google doesn't want information readily available to the extent it was back then, and it seems that bias has also taken over the engine. Google is seemingly choking their engine to withhold information.

[@EasterMegs]

I miss when google would just have a couple of ads off to the right side of the search results screen, and everything on the left was relevant to your search query. It's so annoying to have to sift through the insane amount of ads to find a website that's actually relevant to my search and not trying to sell me something.

[@Pseudiom]

The Good? The Bad? The Google? Does my audience feel like Google has decreased in quality over the years? I feel like Google Images has become noticeably useless as compared to search which is still somewhat usable (I try to use a mixture of search engines and archives/directories). In many ways Google is like mall. There are some useful reasons to go there, but a lot of the place is empty and some of the stores are low quality.

[@georgewilson7432]

Memoria de indecible melancolía...

[@fjdpaco]

I don't know, I don't use Google anymore. I use "clones" like Ecosia or DuckDuckGo. I wish these engines had more modifies ("search: dog -cat "frog" tag:bat" that sort of thing). I don't like push toward AI-generated results, or I guess my concern is of the engine trying to tell me what I want instead of giving me it; If I search for "Kirby" and related stuff about the series of games, I want to wade through fan sites and peoples thoughts and opinions and fanwork, not just show me a word salad starting with the word Kirby. I would love if google had actual competition, or just found as a monopoly and broken up. I think not having to care about good results is the real issue.

[@lsuzicosbw644]

My use of google as a search engine decreased by 90% over the last few years

[@nox5555]

Yeah, it has gotten bad but i think Search has gotten even more useles, everything you are looking full is down the list and everything on top is ads and bought results. Qwant is just like old google....

[@j.2512]

Image searched is completely worthless. Destroyed by AI spam and search results that only show products from Alibaba. If you searh for the origin of a photo it just sends you to buy the outfit that someone is wearing in the photo or an amazon listing for prints of similar photos but not the info you want

[@mothbazooka]

Your channel is a gem, the kind you find in a desert antique shop in the middle of the Mojave desert that has a strange blackish luster and begins swirling when you pick it up, only to set itself back down on the counter (no, I set it down..?) excuse me, ma'am, how much for this one? Ma'am? But the old lady's gone. And where's my car for that matter? And when did it get dark outside? And why is my deceased mother standing outside looking through the window and holding a boar's head, puppeteering it to say "GOBORI GOBORI GOBORI"

[@tsuwaque]

what are you referencing

[@Pseudiom]

You're a regular Clark Ashton Smith.

[@QTwoSix]

Shiny glistening gemerald

[@GoodNight0wl]

I stopped clicking most links a while ago. I'm not even sure how long it's been. I think I got sick of clicking a link, and the link would be an article giving me a seminar on something I don't even care about. If not that, then the entire Google page is filled with store ads, dumb subscriptions I'm not interested in or the ever so growing popular "Sign up and create an account to view this page!"

[@r0100]

I still remember when the Google's slogan was "Don't be evil"

[@crusixblade2852]

Google has actively made it harder to find what I try to find. If i try to find specific stuff, there isn't an option to remove superfluous results. using the old method of "-(thing)" no longer works and will outright ignore the minus. Nor do they let you find certain things in a sort of search shadow ban. They have MADE it worthless on purpose.

[@lopiklop]

I was just thinking about this probably when you were making this video. The internet (at least google search) has become like a magazine stand, it's been 100% gentrified. I didn't think the future would go this way. I didn't think I'd miss internet when I got older. Because it's more prevalent than ever, yet it's not the same thing we loved in the beginning. Cuz we still get the worst of the internet, the glorification of negative traits, the disinformation and envy, but we lost something else, something that made it worth it.

[@christiangonzalez6945]

It became common. Obicous. When you had to know how to dial in a 56 modem the internet was "earned", the internet was "gatekeep" naturally. Now the idiot of the class can post 1000 of bullshit in the time the smart dude is finishing a well though and researched comment.

[@FeedMeSalt]

Perfect example, I had to find the online portal for welfare the other day. Absolutely no combo of wording found the damn site. I needed a direct link. Literally searching the exact acronym didn't work.

[@knurlgnar24]

But they did serve you ads for scam welfare sites, right? Funny how their ad context engine works so much better than their search engine. Kind of shows which one has the priority.

[@whogavehimafork]

It wouldn't even give you the link to a government site?

[@jacklandedhere5157]

Just happened to me. No matter how much I tried, it would just show up useless shit. Had to dig through my history from a month ago to find it. Insane.

[@Salty_C.J.]

google censors search results, a terrible practice that limits the usefulness of its platform.

[@laurencefraser]

the problem with this is that a huge percentage of the job of a Useful search engine that is working properly is... completely indistinguishable from censorship. It's all filtering.

[@thegreatestfallout1794]

​@laurencefraser Thing is, you can look up a hyperspecific title and website, but Google will instead throw all the articles talking about how "awful" the thing you're looking up is. Completely burying the actual article and website you want to be on is frustrating

[@TomyDayos]

It would be very easy to find something with the exacly words, if google didnt changed the exacly words, I alreandy seen a video about how google change for example the quote "local restaurants" is changed to multiple names of brand restaurants, so your result will have a mac donalds or other big name and not the small restaurant right next to you.

[@daughterofsekhmet81]

@@thegreatestfallout1794 This is exactly the problem I have with google and it's so bad with things like politics and current issues. I search to find factual information so I can form my own opinions, not to find out what other people think I should think. Information should be readily available and free of editorializing, but google isn't even trying to hide their agenda anymore.

[@thegreatestfallout1794]

@azmodea Seriously, I just want on-the-ground news and first hand accounts of the war in Israel-Palestine and Russia-Ukraine, but instead all I get are editorials from people hundreds if not thousands of miles away

[@n_n_n_n_n_n]

Using modern search engines is what I feel like leading a high profile interrogation must be like. Except the interrogatee sets all the rules.

[@SpiKSpaN-ei6zq]

😂😂👍

[@benjwgarner]

It's like cross-examining a cartel boss.

[@jayspeidell]

Its literally more efficient to have Q&A Facebook groups and Discord servers for technical topics than Google. Human labor is outperforming machines for research.

[@Magmagan]

And the worst part, it's a vicious cycle. Forums are almost dead. Discord server messages aren't indexed by Google, they are deep web. So more and more users will end up always asking the same questions on Discord servers.

[@worldexterminationradio2856]

This is particularly tragic in the sense that marginalized people have to continually recite complex systemic issues and their personal traumas to independent strangers who are inclined to seek holes in the arguments around racial inequality. This is a losing battle as more and more people get exhausted and opt out of educating those who only engage to reinforce their internal biases.

[@animeloveer97]

also alot of us dont really like discord :(@@Magmagan

[@animeloveer97]

or fb really

[@WheresMyInhaler]

@@worldexterminationradio2856What the fuck does race have to do with that ? Why are you even bringing something like that up ? If someone needs help factory resetting their PC I don’t need to know if they are black or a “marginalized” person . Just their hardware and general knowledge

[@ellepalmer]

it’s crazy that the Reddit trick is something that’s notable enough to put in a video like this. it’s the only way i can find good subjective information now, without expecting sponsored content.

[@Oneiroclast]

Google needed to go scorched earth on grey/black hat SEO and content farms. Not small penalties to individual results, permanently blacklist the entire domain.

[@smileyp4535]

Except this is capitalism, those places pay ad $$$

[@ChrisR2020]

You do realize domains change hands sometimes, right? They get sold and bought. Just because a domain is being misused now, doesn't mean it will be next year or the year after that. Also, if you permanently blacklist domains, then eventually you'll have blacklisted enough of them to have it become a real problem.

[@four-en-tee]

The problem is that this scorched earth method is unfeasible, they'd be at it forever and there's nothing inherently malicious about SEO (god knows I had to utilize it when making a website for a local haircut salon for my capstone). SEO tactics are literally no different than gaming the KZbin algorithm (which also involves SEO among other things). It seems more so that Google as a search platform has just become too dense with results for its own good, not to mention search fatigue is another issue online. The risk of clicking on any malicious sites has greatly eliminated any sort of incentive to keep scrolling through results (unless you're specifically looking for something for an essay or some shit). Ultimately, the system is working as designed. You were meant to scroll through pages after a search, the issue is with the user.

[@ChrisR2020]

@@bonbonbonbons No, the death penalty actually does work, be cause unlike domain names, another person can't step into the corpse once you've sent it to the electric chair.

[@RealDevastatia]

@@ChrisR2020 Exactly. AT&T had my current domain blacklisted via a third party blacklister because of a site that had the domain over 5 years ago. I had to contact the blacklister to check my site and get it removed.

[@NumeroPerdido]

Even worst then google search, is google images. Try search anything, all you will get is: The image you wanted but in a shirt/mug A really low res image from social media that you have to log to see/save The image you wanted but is from a inaccessible dead wordpress site An highly edited image of what you wanted from a youtube thumbnail The image you wanted from a news article, but when you click to see the full the image is not on the article anymore The image you wanted, on page 3 and it's a webp Absolute disgraceful. And God have mercy if what you want is an image with a transparent background...

[@princejellyfish3945]

Thanks for putting in words the absolute lunacy that goes on trying to google a simple image lol Its beyond infuriating

[@russianbot8576]

and now, more and more: a pile of fucking ai generated shit made to be standout and flashy for seo purposes.

[@GLRYB2GD]

Webp is the worst. What is this shit.

[@nuclearmedicineman6270]

I stopped using Google search a couple of years ago. I was looking for performance numbers of thermal batteries.. and I got 15 pages of "how to build an E-bicycle" links. I'm not interested in bikes, never searched for them. No matter how I built the search, excluding bikes, bicycles, e-bikes, using precise searches, the results never changed. I eventually had to get on the phone to my battery guy, and ask him. Another time I was looking for Canadian manufacturing companies. Google decided that since Canadian websites end in .CA, and CA is California, I was really looking for California based outfits. It seems they're trying to "help", by guessing what you really meant, what's popular. And there's absolutely no way to get the results you want. For technical stuff, I'm now going straight to industry forums, or emailing/calling people I know. And for non-tech stuff I'm using anything else than Google.

[@FRIEDYOGURT-s4c]

tbh, its not just this, rot has entered every aspect of society and its genuinly scary

[@urbandruiduk9928]

KZbin is the worst. Search for a recent event and every video it throws up is from 3 years ago. Awesome.

[@opshredderytp]

Or outright porn.

[@badcaseofstripes]

I'm glad to have gotten a bunch of use out of Google Images before it became a dilapidated cesspool.

[@Pseudiom]

Highly recommend YanDex images even if you're a bit suspect of the company. You may have a higher chance of seeing the occasional gore pic (like earlier Google), but its image search and reverse image search work MUCH better. There's other image search engines out there too if you're willing to look.

[@PlayingWithWilson]

​@@Pseudiom gore is what humans want, you'd know that if you were human

[@GoodFuude]

21:55 I always have used "technical" interpretive searches, I've noticed that more people do "conversational" searches now, but I never knew there was a name for that.

[@abb5643]

I love this channel so much. it almost feels like something obscure and esoteric in and of itself. I have been watching for a while and I always love to see you in my subscription feed!

[@AnhedoniaParty]

I remember (adjusts bifocals, taps cane) when searching for tutorials for things would actually bring up blogs or text based results... and the very rapid change. Have found most searches pretty useless since, as it's mostly 9000 links to youtube videos. Thats great and all, but I really don't want to be pausing or scrubbing a video by some dude from Illinois named SenpaiKarburetorKarl when I'm elbow deep in oil and break fluid hoping he actually knows shit about a 2002 Ford Mustang. I miss just being able to find things like manuals without wading through a sea of ads, videos, and redirecting links to god knows where but it has a pay wall... Old man rant over. (Falls asleep immediately, mumbles something about a lawn and fox news)

[@nicholasvinen]

Ah yes, the 10 minute video on how to turn a tap (faucet) on which takes 9:50 to explain what it is, why you need one, the cultural implications etc then shows you how to do it in the last 10 seconds.

[@thatoneartist24]

@@nicholasvinenlet’s not forget the solid 5 minutes of sponsorship ads!

[@KosmonautKong]

Rather than Google dying, I expect most people will just accept that Google sucks and warp their needs around it. Can't find what you're looking for? Oh well, you probably didn't need it, maybe you should go (re)watch the next season of TLoU instead!

[@Pseudiom]

Most people will put up with a broken tool rather than learning something new. I'm guilty of this myself.

[@Noqtis]

It's not that simple. Most people using tech nowadays are completely illiterate when it comes to tech. Many of those are being forced to use it because there are no ways around it. And google works like the ultimate hub. Buy a new smartphone. Open your browser. Write something in the address bar. It will google it. Do you guys know how many internet users don't even understand the concept of an URL and only use the address bar in their browser to google shit? That's a lot of people... And honestly, I couldn't explain to my parents why and how they should use another search engine. Not that I can't explain it, it's more their lack of ability to understand it. And they have became the norm. Not just boomers aren't getting it. Zoomers have a rly hard time as well. Most don't understand the Explorer because it's hidden on your phone. They imagine data gets saved in a huge cloud and just pulled out there if needed.

[@madamebutterfly851]

Or use a different search engine, hello?! Yandex.

[@chaotickreg7024]

This disgusts me. Imagine going to a shopping complex but the only thing they show on the map is Forever 21. If you want to find your people at Pacsun or Hot Topic then you'd have to find it yourself hidden in obscurity underneath the map. If it's not already popular, it will never be.

[@thisisobviouslybait]

@@madamebutterfly851 it's starting to have the same issues outside of image searches being pretty reliable on. Yandex is the best option atm as its the one of the few choices that aren't just running off google or bing's indexes. Mojeek is another option that doesn't run those indexes but it works like a pregoogle era search engine so it's a bit more difficult to find things you want however it does have quite a bit in the way of results you will never see on the more known engines. It's a solid option to check if you can't find something elsewhere.

[@simondaly9960]

Decay ?? No, deliberate restriction of true information. There are still older operating search engines that enable decent searches on specific topics or genres. The published paper example can be found on Google Scholar, BUT, I've found that has also become restricted in scope.

[@benjamindover4337]

Yes, they started aggressively censoring in 2019 during the election.

[@lgbtthefeministgamer4039]

which older search engines are you talking about?

[@simondaly9960]

@@lgbtthefeministgamer4039 I don't keep a list, but, IF you try doing a main search for "(generic- eg, science, literature, history, etc) search engine", you will find still active SEOs that hold links to items Google blocks

[@TrashQueenAndKing]

You can never get a human to respond to their own comment these days huh.

[@georgewilson7432]

In the late 60s Burroughs wrote the Universe was becoming a worn out laugh track in the middle of an empty scenario for a non existent audience. Rewatching this video reminded me of that frightening dictum.

[@lizzy__brock]

Yes!

[@tygerinthenight3255]

The problem I keep running into with google is when I search two words, because I want results that talk about both things and how they relate to each other and it arbitarily decides to give me results that do not include one of them. Then it gives me the option to force include that term. I click it. It just gives me the same page, but now without that option.

[@instantlymeatified]

it is very cool to see old tripod sites surviving for many years, unlike geocities it is very annoying getting "how to" pages when i don't even need a how to for what i'm searching and they flood the search alot and being annoying

[@UD503J]

Even just the first few minutes of this vid hit home for me. I have an older car, and trying to do my own maintenance overwhelmingly takes me to ghost town forums with broken Photobucket photos, dead links to PDF service manuals on bankrupt hosting providers, and "I solved the problem", user last online 20 years ago.

[@MS-37]

I have to use yandex when looking up something “controversial.” The irony…

[@petrosthegoober]

The enshitification of everything: the inevitable end result of the profit motive.

[@Wveth]

This will happen in a cycle to every good thing until we have a big shift in our culture.

[@laurencefraser]

It's the inevitable end result of Any system that involves humans, unfortunately. Doesn't matter what you replace profit with as motivation, if you don't actively act to regulate against perverse incentives (and it is important that the regulation be both good and enforced. Bad regulation just adds to the problem and facilitates corruption, making things worse in turn), you will end up with this sort of problem, one way or another.

[@kriegsdorff]

Nice to see this topic covered in more depth than the typical shortform article or video, nice and informative.

[@webmaristocrat4052]

Bing is unironically better than google now

[@nox5555]

Bing always feels a bit unhinged.

[@Pseudiom]

I agree. They've been working on Bing in the last few years!

[@kathrineici9811]

It really is

[@teslashark]

Bing still can't do exact terms well enough though, even if it's better than years ago

[@Planeet-Long]

I switched to Microsoft Bing in 2012 and later to Ecosia. I just cannot stress how Google isn't "better" in any way but just different. Which actually surprises me as Google has significantly more users, yet it seems to learn nothing from its users.

[@bozboz4414]

KZbin is definitely on life support...remember how awesome KZbin used to be compared to now?

[@killerexe007]

About a month ago I was searching for a somewhat niche song I couldn't remember the name of, but I remembered what I later confirmed to be the exact text of few lines from it. I was unable to find the song searching for the text on Google no matter what I tried. Failing that, I copied the latest search term I was using into Bing AI and immediately got the name of the song.

[@FLUFFYCAT_PNW]

What an awesome video! Learned so much. It's been obvious to everyone with eyes that Google has become less and less useful as they became more and more ubiquitous, but I assumed it was for different reasons. Great stuff. Subscribed.

[@RustyShackleford556]

This... Yeah. That's exactly what it is, thank you for putting this into words for me. The internet as we knew it doesn't exist anymore. RIP the final frontier of true freedom in current day.

[@alanmcnew5376]

I miss back when I could find anything and everything on Google. Now they hide most the stuff I’m looking for.

[@kondition-kode-nine]

Google image search is now a sad and desolate place. Once is was populated by a multiple page myriad of visual interest and novelty. Now it is just one page of Linkedin faces with no relevance to the search.

[@georgewilson7432]

Internet thermodynamic is as melancholic as the real one.

[@Pseudiom]

I guess Milton was right about that whole Chaos and Old Night thing.

[@christiangonzalez6945]

The entrophy its the rule 0 of the universe. Any system inside the universe its prone to it.

[@FreedSeed]

i just want to search for letters which bring up sites that contain the letters in the order i type them in, while falling back on out of order results...

[@Reiman33]

it is neither disease or symptom it is on purpose.

[@cyanocitta3728]

Anyone whos into the car scene knows just how bad its gotten. Been relying on forum posts from 2007 and long dead facebook communities both full of broken links and inaccessible images. Something needs to change soon

[@russianbot8576]

spent days looking for info for the door latch cable for an old honda del sol, even just the length since i could probably rig a newer one if the length was right. old enthusiast forums helped but ultimately it was a frustrating wreck. my driver side still won't open from the inside.

[@look_into_it]

Dude I googled “how long to bake a sweet potato in microwave” and I got a bunch of pages with sweet potato recipes. All I needed to hear was “3 minutes each side”

[@TheNathanNS]

One thing I've noted is that Google seem to be removing the ability to search for old pictures, I was searching for Bigfoot in GTA SA, so I tried the "before:2007" trick, went to images and it said no images available. Given how popular Bigfoot in GTA SA was in 2004 - 2010, I know they're purposely killing their own image search.

[@berserk1437]

Google has been trying to prod users into using Google Lens instead of RIS for years now. It's another thing they seem to regret letting the general public use and have been dialing down while cashing out at the same time. Google Lens is trash unless you're looking to buy something, then it works like a charm! Meanwhile Reverse Image Search has never been readily available to use on mobile and is still buried under options before you're able to use it

[@hunters.dicicco1410]

Geocities has a spiritual successor in the form of Neocities now.

[@unsaltedskies]

Geocities and the era of the "web ring".

[@cascadianrangers728]

I remember being a keyboard cowboy riding a 56k modem way back when the internet was the wild fucking west

[@DrewPicklesTheDark]

Keyboard cowboy, heh, I like that term. But yes, those were the good days.

[@cascadianrangers728]

@@DrewPicklesTheDark thanks, i borrowed it from William Gibson

[@ericmackrodt9441]

Link rot is not a problem that can be solved. Especially because web servers need constant payments and upkeep. If people abandon their websites, they will be deleted after a while. A lot of the issue as well is hustle culture and the idea that you can make a website you don't need to maintain to make passive income. It has filled the internet with absolute trash.

[@benjamindover4337]

The problem has been made much worse due to programming frameworks which get rid of direct links and force everything to be generated on the fly. Often there isn't an actual page to even be linked to anymore.

[@RiriV-unused]

@@benjamindover4337 Which frameworks do that? Frameworks like Sanic and BottlePy can generate pages instead of displaying static HTML, but once they have been accessed once, Google can find and link to them just fine.

[@TheBeefiestable]

The worst aspect: the absolutely vital requirement of internet search was to fix all of the dumb little quirks and bugs of microsoft windows. Now you can't find fixes for very very specific search terms anymore, meaning EVERY SINGLE company on the planet using windows is going to get worse and worse problems piling up. (doesn't help that microsoft quality is constant down hill either now)

[@EpicManaphyDude]

this new internet era we’re falling into is painfully dystopian

[@stealthyjun]

I sometimes have to add "reddit" at the end of a search for more curated results.

[@leonardogerbassi8030]

Same

[@ScienceBabbleMusic]

It's a shame ain't it?

[@j.2512]

and reddit is nothing but astroturfed garbage filled with bots

[@comfylain]

I greatly dislike reddit, but adding "reddit" onto the end of a query is almost essential, especially if you're looking for information on anything hobby related like games and computers.

[@Pseudiom]

Same. It is a unfortunate necessity sometimes since Google seems to dislike showing actual hobbyist forums.

[@josueramirez7247]

I learned that in the past, Google would return very good results for when people searched for a phone number in the US. But they removed it because it seemed very privacy invasive to everyone.

[@danielnicoletti2416]

Amazing channel. Congratulations on the diligence and quality of your content.

[@Pseudiom]

Thank you!

[@saphiredragon5144]

I haven't used google in years, pivoting to browsers and other products that are more transparent and open source. There's no such thing as privacy or anonymity on the modern web, only things that come close or give false promises. Only google products i actively use are youtube and gmail, mostly because I'm too lazy to switch my email that i've used for 10+ years, and youtube is self-explanatory.

[@TomyDayos]

I fully agree with you.

[@lenargilmanov7893]

Which ones are those? Brave?

[@saphiredragon5144]

@@lenargilmanov7893 I don’t use brave personally, I’ve heard it’s okay. I use Firefox with the settings that are *supposed* to help it be more private. I’m probably delusional thinking it helps but that’s my personal daily driver.

[@saphiredragon5144]

@@lenargilmanov7893I use Firefox personally, tweaked to be better for privacy. From what I’ve heard brave is better out the box but I don’t trust the funny lion browser.

[@musiqtee]

This is expected, if seen from the angle of critique of capitalism and behavioral economics. Premise: Google search was primarily a tool for users searching the general internet. Secondarily a tool for nominal growth by capitalizing from middle-man values (user data, ads, paid services, seo…) *between* the user and the primary function of search results as URL’s. Now imagine that the primary and secondary roles above trade places - not by chance, but by governance by the owners. There are countless incitements to grow the nominal (financial) values vs the real (produced) ones. Most large enterprises do this, and ironically get ‘inefficient’, a trait we normally attribute to governments or public services. Financially efficient yes, inefficient for users and search targets outside of those who engage financially. So, the ‘efficiency’ argument is true when any entity shifts from real to nominal growth, in economy or politics. At the end, we live in a political economy, where democratic and corporate forces influence. The missing transparency will confuse, and lead to conspiring about the legally protected information.

[@beloved-child]

Reddit search engine makes google search feel like a world library with a quick find

[@ZombieCSSTutorials]

Way back in the day there was a struggle with Google on whether to be influenced by it's popularity or by having links shown based on business and paid links. They ultimately chose the latter. It could be fixed, they purposely do not want to do that. Unless you are an artificially propped up, top tier site you will not break out on Google search.

[@emmadrew50]

I really appreciate your sourcing and giving timestamps for the music you use!

[@TheSmart-CasualGamer]

The "Before:" function has been so useful for me.

[@HarakiriRock]

I started adding reddit to the end of my searches years ago after realizing it was the only site in the results with remotely relevant information. It's sad what the internet has become. Used to be able to find almost anything on a random obscure forum or blog, but not anymore.

[@TheDeadmanTT]

I google searched my dad, but still . . .

[@sourgreendolly7685]

Literally same 😂

[@cs8712]

"showing results for 'ad' " " *search instead for dad* "

[@Pabliski577]

Once you notice how he finishes every sentence, there's no going back. I can't watch this video

[@waxmeltfan]

This video is so well made and I totally agree with you, I have to stop watching because it’s so distracting lol

[@BiggestCorvid]

What does this mean.

[@bplus2351]

So glad youre still uploading man, found your channel a year or so ago and have just been waiting for it to blow up, you cover some seriously unique topics and are really a diamond in the rough. Hold you up there with channels like atrocity guide in terms of uniqueness and quality of research.

[@Thinkingnamesishard]

Great video. Been worried about this topic for years. I used to have real big ego about being able to find anything on Google. Now it's becoming impossible to use it for anything. Part of it has to be shift of internet culture, but biggest clue I found was that Google would return the most profitable results for Google. To make money

[@edzielinski]

The changes in Google Search mirror the changes in most "free" or ad-supported internet services. The period of rapid growth and expansion and exploration is over, yet costs are still rising, so it's a time of consolidation and ROI focus, and that's the antithesis of free, open and unbiased search results. It's Google's Roman Empire dilemma. You can't be big and agile and grow rapidly forever. You end up spending a lot of your time trying to maintain internal stability and securing borders against outside threats. Meanwhile, disruptive forces multiply and breed in an evolutionary manner across the entire world. That's the dinosaur dilemma.

[@MuscleCarLover]

Lately it has become increasingly common for me to search something up, only to get everything EXCEPT what I wanted

[@DoctorAids]

Gotta love looking up tutorials for a program, and then the results are all either sponsored websites or complete and utter junk.

[@ImpeccableWizard]

I am not old, but I still have built my own computer at 7 years old. I loved it and at 11 years old I learned Intel x86 assembly, at 13 I learned m86k and z80 and in school with my Texas instrument graphical calculator I wrote several games and programs, like tetris and a maze game. I even used the fact that it took some time for the screen to change from black to white and made a grayscale raytracer. But I think that the most popular program I invented was a program that emulated the basic system of the calculator, the unintended consequences was that people were using it to fool teachers that they had a vanilla system while they had programs that helped them cheat on tests.. 🙄 Oh, my..

[@tripleoof8159]

37:27 Regarding the lack hobby related resources: wikia is a prime example of this issue. The piggyback the general “brand” of Wikipedia, while being for profit (the abundance of ads suck).The format of the site makes certain info less intuitive to show, and the mods of the wikia don’t have full control!Mcdonald’s paid wikia to change the Grimace page as a joke without transparency that it was a marketing stunt. This is a huge red flag to mods of different communities. If wikia could just be paid to alter the information present, what’s the point? The “major” communities did an exodus because of this. Rightfully so. not to mention the ai generated “summary” portion of a wikia’s page. it often gives wrong info. Yet wikia is the first in results. It’s frustrating.

[@animeloveer97]

im sure it wasnt the first time they have been paid to change stuff. i still dont think its credible lol. teachers in the 2000s were right.

[@Ryndika]

I tried to find ASMR gaming videos (using just 3 words: asmr, whisper, game) and very first result was barber cutting someone and it going very wrong. Similar results happen regularly.

[@TaZerrHD]

This topic was on my mind for so long, thank you for nailing it down, very informative!

[@jsnadrian]

the ignoring of operators was the beginning of the end. an admission google’s suggestions were more important than the user’s query.

[@skivvy3565]

Yeah booth googled and KZbin search seem more like pandering advertisements of recommended stuff instead of whatever I’m actually trying to find.

[@agawtdangedbear]

Just a tip for youtube, if you click the top left "filter" button after you search and pick "videos" then it will get rid of all the extra recommended stuff and only show you actual search results.

[@berserk1437]

I feel like they push the content from users that paid in/interact they way they want them to. Instead of new content it's a mill and echo chamber of likeminded users, who in most cases just want people to pay into some kind of subscription

[@JoeSmith-cy9wj]

Once an elderly friend asked me to find the number of a local restaurant she knew with take-out. The first result was a match under my location. We put in the order and after a few minutes i left on my bicycle to pick up the food. Five blocks from her house I knocked on the door of a dark and empty establishment. Another call revealed I needed to ride approximately eight hundred miles to retrieve dinner. Needless to say there were no happy parties on any side of that triangle. Thank god she didn't pay over the phone.