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Google Kneecaps Loads Of Very Big Websites After SEO Change (aftermath.site)
submitted 2 years ago by to c/technology@lemmy.world
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[–] 61 points 2 years ago (2 children)

This sort of thing is why Google's monopoly on the internet is so dangerous.

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  • [–] 43 points 2 years ago (5 children)

    Because they are making so that we get less results that are just cheating the system to show up at the top?

    SEO is a bastardization of a useful tool, solely meant to game the system artificially

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  • [–] 29 points 2 years ago (2 children)

    SEO is only feasible in the first place because we have one dominant search engine instead of a bunch of equally-prominent ones with different algorithms that would need to be optimized for differently (and maybe even mutually-exclusively).

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  • [–] 4 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    Copy paste.

    There are a ton of them, the problem is none of them are as good as google.

    I hear there are good pay ones, though I have never tried one.

    I can usually find what I need on google pretty damn quick, although I have seen the end page more than once

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  • [–] 2 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    I found search results surprisingly bad when I had to use is on another computer. I use Kagi (and yes it costs money but I rather pay that than pay with my data) which gives me way more accurate results. Google might have been the best search engine until a few years ago but from my experience it is not anymore.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago (1 child)

    Kagi is just Google's index with fancy features and filtering on top. They include a few other sources but for regular search it's almost always going to be Google's index providing the base results.

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  • [–] 0 points 2 years ago (2 children)

    That's not true. They use their own index

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  • [–] 5 points 2 years ago* (1 child)

    Wow, looks like they just updated that page and removed all references to their external indexes. Very shady stuff, Kagi. I'd go as far as to say they are now lying by omission.

    The archived version of that page from March does open with (emphasis mine):

    Our data includes anonymized API calls to traditional search indexes like Google, Mojeek and Yandex, specialized search engines like Marginalia, and sources of vertical information like Apple, Wikipedia, Open Meteo, and other APIs.

    Then it goes on to say:

    Kagi's indexes provide unique results that help you discover non-commercial websites and "small web" discussions surrounding a particular topic.

    Now reading between the lines, and more importantly knowing how much sheer capital goes into indexing the entire web, I can say with much certainty that Kagi is probably powered mostly by Google since it and Bing (which they aren't using) are basically the only meaningful players in the space. Yandex is for the Russosphere, and Mojeek is nice but nowhere even close to Google or Bing's coverage. By their own admission Teclis is more narrowly focused and not meant to replace Google's index. So I'm going to go ahead and call them big fat liars.

    I wouldn't even care that Google is their main index, that's fine and they can't be expected to compete with the billions of dollars Google spends on indexing. But the lack of transparency and shady business practices are a big turn-off for me.

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  • [–] 14 points 2 years ago* (1 child)

    Well, yes, but in a broader sense, they have way too much of a stake in the control of global communications altogether. Even just a hiccup on their servers or slight change to their system has a global impact, as obviously evidenced here. The world is dangerously reliant on a centralized private company for daily functioning.

    Such a powerful entity shouldn't be controlled by private parties and needs to be governed in a way that the benefit of the people is kept paramount.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago (1 child)

    So you are wanting to do what here exactly?

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  • [–] 3 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    Not really anything to do but draw attention to it... It's not like we have an effective globally governing body to oversee something like this objectively.

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  • [–] -2 points 2 years ago* (1 child)

    No, i meant what solution would you like to see here.

    Like just taking the business away from the company and have the government seize it?

    Because other than just building a new one that organically grows and becomes better, then I don’t see a solution.

    Maybe regulate the hell out of it, but that’s basically just seizing it and forcing them to do what you want.

    I do agree it is a precarious situation though

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  • [–] 7 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 child)

    I mean, I'm a fan of regulatory action, in the same vein as what was proposed with net neutrality originally, and dissolution of the monopoly. The services Google provides are vital to the functioning of the internet, and as such, must be treated as a governed utility the same way internet provision should be, with tight definitions of services and regulations to control what can be done and when. In that regard, companies like Google and Amazon(in regard to AWS) would be classified as utility providers similar to ISPs with the same degree of accountability in regard to service provision, availability, transparency of policy and actions, liability, etc.

    In addition, break up the monopoly accordingly. Entertainment services, telephony/internet/communication services, electronics development, however it would be appropriate. Problem is how many of those services overlap and likely where they'd argue that the company can't be broken up.

    Like you said, that's like seizing their business from them and it also doesn't account for global factors. However, each nation is ultimately responsible for how companies operate within their borders, internet service providers should be no different.

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  • [–] 7 points 2 years ago* (1 child)

    Because they are making so that we get less results that are just cheating the system to show up at the top?

    No, because they are failing to hide low quality search results. Something the would invest more money in if an alternative search engine existed.

    There are so many websites now that just shouldn't exist at all. And they wouldn't exist if Google didn't send tons of traffic their way.

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  • [–] 0 points 2 years ago

    What websites do you think shouldn’t be allowed to exist here?

    You find what you search for, shitty companies game the system with SEO because they are shitty and it’s the only way for them to get access.

    Google is trying to make that harder for them to do.

    Why is them making SEO harder a bad thing?

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  • [–] 4 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    If there were more search systems/engines there would be a wider variety of ways search results are optimized. Meaning SEO would have a greater level of diminishing returns. Having a single player creates a single point of weakness in search.

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  • [–] 0 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    There are a ton of them, the problem is none of them are as good as google.

    I hear there are good pay ones, though I have never tried one.

    I can usually find what I need on google pretty damn quick, although I have seen the end page more than once

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  • [–] 3 points 2 years ago* (1 child)

    I can usually find what I need on google pretty damn quick

    It depends what you're searching for. Some things are very hard to find that used to be easy.

    The solution I'd like to see is for Google to stop being anticompetitive. For example it just leaked that they pay half of their company wide profits to Apple in order to stop Apple from using (or creating) another search engine.

    Stop spending tens of billions of dollars per year trying to keep competition away, and instead invest all of that money into making Google Search a better product.

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