[alistair77]

That's confusing two different concepts. URLs are the equivalent of a full postal address whereas searching is the equivalent of asking a stranger how to get somewhere. Why would you want to always ask and trust a search engine when you already know how to get somewhere? DNS spoofing aside, I know I can trust anything under, for example, bbc.co.uk and I know where /radio, /news etc takes me. Guess what, so do my seventy year old parents!

[CodeCube]

That's a sample size of one person's experience. I on the other hand am constantly meeting people who's only mode of navigation on the web involves typing the word "facebook", or "gmail", or, yes, even "google" into the address bar, and then clicking on the relevant google search result. It drives me crazy, and despite my constant wailings using the same exact argument you make above ("Why would you want to always ask and trust a search engine when you already know how to get somewhere?") ... they simply shrug their shoulders and keep on keepin' on.

[alistair77]

Yes, I can't argue with that, though I am meeting an increasing number of non-techies who are interested in different (better) ways of using the web and IT in general.

[shocks]

Most people (non-techies) I know will search "facebook" to get to facebook.com. The same with YouTube/Twitter/etc.

[moreati]

My goto example of this is when a ReadWriteWeb article briefly become the top Google result for 'Facebook login' http://readwrite.com/2010/02/11/how_google_failed_internet_m...

[Shish2k]

Some people I know will search for "google" using the browser's search box to get to google, then type in "yahoo" into google to find yahoo's website, then click the "mail" icon to get at their email /o\

[shocks]

Hehe, I have seen this done. Crazy. :/