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by IanCal 3146 days ago
> Search quality is no longer a core competency of Google, the Internet’s premiere search engine. For example: Two people type the same search string, each receives different results. Yes, I am aware that this is likewise no accident.

This is not an example of low search quality and can easily be the opposite.

If I search for ruby gems, I probably want code. If someone else does, they may want actual gems.

> The quality of ads displayed alongside various Google services has steadily devolved from semi-relevant to absolutely irrelevant at all times. Yes, I am aware that this is no accident.

What possible incentive would they have to serve up less relevant adverts?

> telepathic contact

Reading and writing != telepathic.

> Not a replacement for anything.

That's a bad thing?

2 comments

The core issue with Google today is that they've backed away from their mission of "organizing the world's information". They killed Google books, Google scholar is an afterthought, and most results either point to wikipedia or spam. They are definitely falling behind.
They killed Google books

What does this mean?

Google books is done. Yes, the website is up, but they aren't scanning new books and gave up on the backlog. Try it yourself, go look for any book published since 2016.
Wasn't there a large lawsuit that stopped that one?
Nope, Google won.
That's the most unsettling part. They got a monopoly on online book previews, and abandoned it.
> If I search for ruby gems, I probably want code. If someone else does, they may want actual gems.

So they search for "ruby gems" and you search for "ruby gems code." This nails in OP's point:

> Insight: Google does not want you to know or remember. Anything, if at all possible.

But if they search "ruby gems" their results for gemstones will include programming results. So instead they need to search for "ruby gems gemstone", but then some clever person names their ruby library gemstone and they need to add more qualifiers and so on.
No, I search for "ruby gems".

What about that means I don't "know or remember anything"?

The second line of your post is answered by the first.
I'm really not following. What is it that Google wants me to not know or remember?