Google Search "Monetized to Death, Soulless, and Exhausting"

One of the most-used tools on the internet is not what it used to be.

[Brett_Tabke]

Try searching for a product on your smartphone and you’ll see that what was once a small teal bar featuring one “sponsored link” is now a hard-to-decipher, multi-scroll slog, filled with paid-product carousels; multiple paid-link ads; the dreaded, algorithmically generated “People also ask” box; another paid carousel; a sponsored “buying guide”; and a Maps widget showing stores selling products near your location. Once you’ve scrolled through that, multiple screen lengths below, you’ll find the unpaid search results. Like much of the internet in 2022, it feels monetized to death, soulless, and exhausting.

[theatlantic.com...]

[BigKat]

For me I first have to dismiss the "Google recommends Chrome" when using Safari on my iPhone to search for a GE water filter. I'm presented with a massive Amazon block (takes up the whole screen without scrolling) along with another Google box to dismiss (Get the new Google widget). Under this is more ads, YouTube, etc. To say it feels Google has monetized products searches to death is accurate. It almost looks like an act of desperation on their part, but searchers have been gradually conditioned to accept such results as the best there is.

[Beachboy]

"...is now a hard-to-decipher, multi-scroll slog...." Perfect description.

[Lexur]

But be in no doubt that things are going to get even worse.

Right now there are some posts and tweets circulating about whether Google will retain even more traffic by offering more "answers to user questions" (read "stolen content") on its results pages via snippets.

Google is the enemy.

[JesterMagic]

@Lexur good point.

One thing I wished the article talked more about is how Google wants to be an answer engine and keep visitors on their own properties and only others if an ad is clicked on.

Google is really trying to parse the answer the user wants and displays it directly in their widgets, feature snippets etc. This means the website which did all the research is not getting any of the benefits.

Major media outlets are getting some income from Google now but this doesn't help smaller publishers at all. Of course Google controls how all this works which is again another conflict of interest.

[Brett_Tabke]

>One thing I wished the article talked more about is how

Atleast they mentioned it at all. Dwell Time on Google.com is the single biggest reason for Google's continued increases quarter after quarter.

[Beachboy]

A year ago, I reached the CEO of Mozilla and suggested they start building their own search engine and roll it out via Firefox. Open source, if need be. No reply. Google needs competition, and Microsoft ain't it.

[randle]

Interesting article but like a lot of views, opinions and essays these days about Google it tends to over complicate what it currently is. When you spent time using Google to search for things 15 years ago most of what you were exposed to was information, contained within web sites that people had built for various reasons; hobbies, just wanted to share their experiences with others, a place to sprinkle adsense, products people had for sale, company sites. Along with that were some surrounding ads (Adwords) of an amount that was less than the organic results. The majority of what was returned, at its core, was information that was relevant to what you were looking for. The key words that you used were the dominant factor in determining what you were exposed to. The results were generally relevant because there wasn't any bias in what got returned.

These days no matter what you search for (wether you use quotes or not) there is an injection placed by Google into your search that instills a bias into the results that your there to purchase something. You don't have to add the key words "buy", "purchase", "where can I find..", ect. because Google has already done that as a base part of the algorithm. People tend to think about how bad the "results" are and don't ponder how the "search" is being influenced to return those results.

You can't generate record profits quarter, after quarter, after quarter by returning free information that people consume and then go on there merry way. Case in point; a few weeks ago I was searching for a way to modify a popular barbecue grill that is made for use on a boat, due to a very frustrating way the grease would drip out of this thing and end up all over the place. However, no matter what I did, what key words I used, how long I made the search phrase all I got were ads, videos and sites that were trying to sell me this type of grill. There is absolutely no question in my mind some other person who was similarly plagued by this design flaw had come up with a cheap and simple modification to fix this problem and wrote about it in some boating blog but that information is not being returned because the results are oriented toward a purchase.

Can you still search for just information and have relevant results on that query returned? Of course, we all do it all the time; what movies was that actor in? when is the summer solstice? whats the distance to the moon? But if that search has anything to do with a product thats sold, the commercialization bias will be injected into the results returned and you have no control over that. You cant use negative keywords and phrases, like "I'm NOT looking to purchase this thing..." it doesn't work, Ive tried.

Google has moved on from the "organizing the worlds information" model and now leverage search to be a monetization machine. When you step onto there field of play the most important question they ask themselves is; how can all the various entities involved monetize this visitor? Years ago it was how can we return the most relevant results to this visitor?

Its not there fault, no matter how bad this monetization torture is there isn't any where else you can go that offers a better search experience and thats why its gotten to the point we are at.

[RedBar]

how can all the various entities involved monetize this visitor? Years ago it was how can we return the most relevant results to this visitor?

Absolutely, you the consumer, are the product for G's exploitation in the most efficient manner possible. Sure there are loads of people out there who do want to buy however G only has one focus now and it's the consumer's pocket, organising the world's information died in ... let's say 2008 along with many other things.

[brotherhood of LAN]

>I'm presented with

All kinds of that pattern, isn't there. Even on YouTube to dismiss a recommendation it takes 4 clicks and should only take one or two.


I think the next step for Google is to remove their crutch on Wikipedia for knowledge boxes just like they did with DMOZ. That's what they do, they're unilateral on their notion of 'serving the world's information', they'll cut out anyone they can, particularly the organic web that made them who they are.

People are so conditioned to searching with Google that they're a little perplexed when a different algorithm comes into play, particularly with synonyms and the advanced NLP they do nowadays.

It was obvious in the late 90s that Google offered a step change in improvement with their off page measurements. They are orders of magnitude ahead of the field now and always have been. Problem is that people are too conditioned to using Google as well as them being the 'default' pretty much everywhere that has web access. I think half the problem is that people can't be bothered to search twice, also the younger generation just tend to search rather than retain things like bookmarks or phone numbers.

Then there's the issue of people using alternatives like DDG and not even knowing they're a reskin of Bing, like it's some whole new representation of the web, it isn't.

There's also the issue of crawlers getting blocked if they're not G/Bing. Some new entrants just follow Googlebot rules, not even bothering with the spirit of robots.txt standard because it gives them an inherent disadvantage.

The solution may be legal intervention but also the tech crowd that first championed Google should donate a few searches in other locations and make the alternatives more viable.

As @randle covered surely there's space for the original 10 blue links with a bit more prominence than one entity, one lens trying to convey all points of view, for everyone.

[EditorialGuy]

At least Google hasn't followed the media industry's trend of slathering display ads almost everywhere (including those giant WP and NYT banners at the top of the page) and force-feeding its users with native ads from the likes of Outbrain and Taboola.

Unfortunately, greed has become almost ubiquitous on the Web, and the days of editorial self-discipline seem to be over. Today's editorial mantra seems to be "Let's test to see what users will tolerate," whether we're talking about Google or a major news site.

[Brett_Tabke]

>end of slathering display ads

Have you been to Google lately on a phone? Page one of the results are not uncommon to be 100% ads.

[mosxu]

@EditorialGuy

Say what sorry but I did not understand a thing you said.

[EditorialGuy]

Have you been to Google lately on a phone? Page one of the results are not uncommon to be 100% ads.

Not display ads, though (see my statement). But in any case, your example merely supports what I said: "Today's editorial mantra seems to be 'Let's test to see what users will tolerate,' whether we're talking about Google or a major news site. "

For commercial searches, Google has become comparable to the Yellow Pages (dominated by ads, with information as filler) or the ad-driven "shopper" publications of the pre-Internet era. That's driven largely by the fact that most content on the Web--including search results--is free or cheap for the user. It would be interesting to see how many people would willingly pay (and how much they'd pay) for an ad-free Google Search. Not many, I suspect. It might be a nice option for serious searchers to have, though.

[tangor]

Unfortunately, greed has become almost ubiquitous on the Web, and the days of editorial self-discipline seem to be over.

This is a logical event in that all users these days are ad blind (if not running ad blockers) and "natural" income from ads is hitting the skids. Won't be long before PAID SEARCH is put out there, or made mandatory (like your phone, internet, electricity bills)

Mark my words. (sigh)

[ichthyous]

Google has moved on from the "organizing the worlds information" model and now leverage search to be a monetization machine.

I agree with @randle that it's really a lot simpler than a lot of the articles and discussions out there make it out to be...Google has made a decision to sacrifice organic search entirely in the name of increased revenue. We have all been watching this coming down the rails like a speeding freight train for years and now the nightmare scenario none of us wanted to face is here...Google will no longer be sending free traffic our way...as little as it can for now, then zero.

It's just pay to play now, and they can't hide that through smoke and mirrors and BS explanations about their supposed lofty goals to serve the public, or blame it on AI growing pains. What we need to communicate to everyone in our own spheres of influence is that Google is in the process of killing thousands or even millions of small businesses and livelihoods that depend on being found through organic search. It's another nail in the coffin of the small business and the concentration of wealth in fewer and fewer hands. "Creative destruction" in action? No way, it's just one of the biggest monopolies in history stomping us all like grapes to make their wine.