Edward Zitron has been reading all of google’s internal emails that have been released as evidence in the DOJ’s antitrust case against google.
This is the story of how Google Search died, and the people responsible for killing it.
The story begins on February 5th 2019, when Ben Gomes, Google’s head of search, had a problem. Jerry Dischler, then the VP and General Manager of Ads at Google, and Shiv Venkataraman, then the VP of Engineering, Search and Ads on Google properties, had called a “code yellow” for search revenue due to, and I quote, “steady weakness in the daily numbers” and a likeliness that it would end the quarter significantly behind.
HackerNews thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40133976
MetaFilter thread: https://www.metafilter.com/203456/The-core-query-softness-continues-without-mitigation
You just described the categories pages many search engines had before Google. Or proto Web 2.0 bookmark sharing sites like del.icio.us. Sites like Metafilter also existed as a kind of Internet index before everyone was adding reddit.com to their Googling. It’s a laudable idea, but these systems all seem to fall prey to market manipulation in much the same way that SEO helped kill Google.
It’s interesting that you mention MetaFilter, because they’re literally in the process of transitioning fully to a non-profit organization.
https://metatalk.metafilter.com/26430/MeFi-Nonprofit-Update-March-26-2024
They’re the only aggregator that still isn’t flooded with ads and has pretty decent moderation policies.
There’s absolutely a reason I linked to the discussion over there: because it’s quality, and it’s the first place I saw the article pop up.
Wow, that’s really neat.
Thanks for letting me know about MetaFilter and its transition to NPO. This really seems like a great move for the site.
I’ve heard of the site before, but haven’t had the chance to try it before. Guess a bit late is better than never, right? :D