[ssp]

The address bar in the browser is totally broken from a usability standpoint.

If you change it, it doesn't reflect the page you are looking at. This means for example that you can get into a screwed up situation where:

  - you are looking at page a

  - page b is being loaded

  - page c is displayed in the address bar

Which is not only highly confusing in itself, it also looks identical to page c being loaded.

There is just no conceivable mental model that non-nerds can build that can predict the behavior of the address bar. When that's the case, people fall back on scripts, in this case "go to google.com; type in what you are looking for; hit return;"

In fact, I've sometimes wondered if you could make a competitor to the web that would be much easier to use.

[cchooper]

That's only the start of it. How many people who use the web know what http means, or why it appears in their address bar? And how many people at all know what :// is for?

[Splines]

:// isn't for anything (the "//" anyway): http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/10/12/the-webs-inventor-r...