Ricardo GTSGoogling stuff, then and now
Adam Bishop@richard I'm not sure what to do about this. A lot of my work has been wrangling web contents on webpages. Now, it seems that all this content serves only as a backend for AI answers, with people increasingly not visiting or reading any actual websites. For the moment, the content is still being produced, albeit in a different form, in order to be more machine digestible. But big changes are afoot in how anybody actually reaches an audience, especially in the public mainstream.
Open RiskNot sure anybody knows. For sure two important informal social contracts that have been core to a functioning Web have been broken:
1) Dont bring down websites when you access their contents
2) Dont grab and use their content without any credit whatsoever
Ofcourse dodgy actors were always doing that, but now it is not fringe, it is the most celebrated and financially rewarded behavior.
I don't think we can go back. Something new and less open will emerge.
@openrisk @AdamBishop I agree, a new underground web will emerge from the ashes. Possibly more akin to early web?
it cant be exactly like the early web because it would suffer from the same problems. But one may well ask whether the spirit of the early web can be preserved and reincarnated, but on more explicit contracts this time🌱
I dont know the answers and it will likely involve diverse innovations, both technical and legal. But the concept of a "web" is too important to turn to ashes. Society should know this, but its still largely a digitally iliterate society🥶
Mark Hughes@openrisk
One route will be to stop optimising for search providers who do this, and where possible against them. This is already happening and can grow.
Another will be to forget search and integrate better with 'good' social, such as fedi. Fedi Will continue to grow and providing it isn't taken over and enclosed can become a better online home for publishers and readers. It already is of course, but not mainstream. I wonder if we'll need p2p for that, but rn fedi leads.
@richard @AdamBishop
María Arias de Reyna@richard @openrisk @AdamBishop I'm already filtering AI bots on my website. True, I don't make money from it, but they won't scrap my content for their nefarious use.
Will I lose the few users I had? Maybe. I don't care. I never wrote for them anyway.
CockneyLaurie
Graham Perrin<https://www.google.com/search?q=Googling+stuff%2C+then+and+now&udm=14>
― the thing I want
― no AI results …
Top match: <https://www.reddit.com/r/Wellthatsucks/comments/1d3zgdw/googling_stuff_then_vs_now/> (2024-05-30).
<https://addons.mozilla.org/addon/udm14/>
@AdamBishop I am glad my days of SEO of a website are long gone. I wouldn't know where to start trying to optimise my website now. Maybe I would concentrate on providing unique content but then it would just be swept into mainstream AI with no credit given. At a loss with this
🌸 Vårgubben@AdamBishop When I started to read the above I fist got the inclination to tell you to ”just use DuckDuckGo or Qwant”. But then I read on and your highlighting a larger problem.
When I a little pup there where four major newspapers; we only had only public service radio and TV. This was where people got the news, and thereby their understanding of the world.
Then we got commercial TV, the and eventually the public internet, and with the later voices became more diverse.
…
@AdamBishop … now it seems we’re going in the opposite direction, with all media accumulating under a handful of US tech companies. It seems bleak.
But here’s the comforting part: the two small newspapers I read these days are both way older then me. They where always there, and I don’t think they’ll go away (even under our current regime).
Like this there will be two layers of internet. The ’normies’ will accept whatever disgusting gruel they are served, but you do not have to.
@jordgubben I do use DuckDuckGo and I am here on Mastodon. Alternatives do and will always exist. What I am more concerned about at the moment is the mainstream, as a source of work, a space for entrepreneurship and employment, opportunities to reach a wider audience, and a cultural dimension that can be nurtured. It's like there are two parallel universes, one tiny, curated and diverse, and the other going to pot. There is hope for alternatives to gain ground, but we need both bread and roses.
Epic Null@jordgubben @AdamBishop I think the idea that they will accept anything is flawed. What I would expect to see is a limited staying power on the slop, but then a massive user dropoff as the slop loses its use.
People use tools to complete tasks. It is that simple.
Google made it easy to complete tasks in the past, so people used it. If Google no longer allows for completing tasks:
Technical people will find alternative tools. Non-technical people may find alternative tasks. Either way, the staying power breaks.
I mean, I hope you’re right, @Epic_Null.
The main idea I was trying convey to @AdamBishop is that there’s going to be options, because we will make it so.
Questions is more for how long it will take for the remainder to move (if at all).
Remember the Twitter exodus. Some yeeted to Mastodon, other left for Blusky. A staggering number of both individuals and organisations are still there! Now and then someone jumps over; it’s movement, but it’s is a slow crawl.
@jordgubben @AdamBishop Despite the issues and quality drop, Twitter still enables its task. It still allows users to communicate with each other.
I do not believe this to be the same as what Google is getting themselves into.
@stevewfolds@richard
Had set Google to not remember searches. That’s been turned back on. It’s the same now on YouTube where I also had history turned off. Ad free YouTube has recently gone up ~30%
Had set Google to not remember searches. That’s been turned back on. It’s the same now on YouTube where I also had history turned off. Ad free YouTube has recently gone up ~30%
tootbruteBlock cookies on YouTube.com. then, you can still be logged onto other Google services if you want. You won't be shown any suggested videos.
Install sponsorblock for youtube.
Install uBlock origin or adnaseum
I've never seen a YouTube ad.
Gin Kangaroo@richard @grrrr_shark
LOLsob! And yay for @Mojeek
Also, in case anyone in tech support sees this, pls to stop flagging me as a bot and let me search again. I am not a bot. I just have ADHD and fast laptop!
🇪🇺 Paul Schoonhoven 🍋🍉@richard @archeokluit 'Altavista' all over again. 🙃😅
But even worse ...
wortwart
DJ🌞
Jari Komppa 🇫🇮@richard I also recall that early on, google saved bandwidth (and thus, energy) by optimizing single bytes out of their landing page, and now they're willing to burn tons by serving AI responses to everyone...
Lor 💬
Frans Super 🇺🇦🇵🇸🍋 FKNZS🔻@richard Quite right. And we hate it.
★ Normie ★@richard
Quant
Mojeek
StartPage
etc
whatever you're on, it shouldn't be Google
@normjess Yeah, I don't have Google in my life at all now
Pascale_PH@pascale @richard
DuckDuckGo has started crowbaring in AI features 
you can avoid that stuff by using noai.duckduckgo.com, but the fact its an option at all doesn't fill me with confidence about their priorities
also, for a while, they didn't block Microsoft stuff, though they have started again, probably from backlash
I think a lot of people will be inclined to swap out Google for DuckDuckGo and turn their brain off, but no single company should have a monopoly on web searching
EndicottRoad59@richard So true.
TawdryHepburnAlternative ALT Text:
Image shows modern searches showing AI nonsense, sponsored results, things people also ask, and products for sale rather than search results.
@TawdryHepburn so true
Ross of Ottawa@richard you have to be of a certain age to remember their arrival. Alta Vista was king, but then they began sticking sponsored links in, looking like your search results and we were horrified that they could be so sleazy.
Google arrived at the right moment with good results and no promoted fake hit/ads. The shift was immediate and AV was toast.
Sadly they're worse now than AV ever was. If only they'd stuck to their original motto. I haven't used them as my go-to resource in years now.
David Chisnall (*Now with 50% more sarcasm!*)The sponsored links were mildly annoying but the main thing I grew to hate about AltaVista was that they put so much stuff in that their search page took 30s to load with my modem. Browsers that let you start by submitting the search query directly improved this slightly, but it still took a long time to load the results. The Google search page was plain text, minimal styling, and loaded almost instantly. The results were a bit better, but I could visit and (if irrelevant) discard the top two Google search results before the AltaVista results loaded.
@david_chisnall @richard yeah, it was so clean, crisp and quick. A breath of fresh air.
I guess we were all learning what you could and couldn't get away with in the earliest attempts to monetize. It's almost a surprise it took as long as it has for the whole thing to get bogged down in money-grubbing crap.
Back then, Google AdWords were also amazing:
- They were based on the content of the page, so were directly relevant to stuff I was interested in right at the time I was reading the page.
- They were plain text, so they weren't distracting.
- They were plain text, so they were instant to load.
- They didn't include JavaScript, so they weren't a malware vector and were quick to load.
I clicked on a lot of Google AdWords back then, because they were non-intrusive things that showed me products I wanted to buy. At the time, DoubleClick was the exact opposite: the kind of ads so annoying I blocked all of their domains. Sadly, Google bought DoubleClick and made all of their ads like DoubleClick's ones.
The last time I clicked on a Google ad was probably 15 years ago. Apparently they work for some people, but I just find them so annoying that they're more likely to make me avoid a site and treat a brand that uses them as suspicious than I am to click on them and buy stuff.
@david_chisnall @richard oh yes! AdWords. Forgot about those. I ran a couple of campaigns myself. The much more understated and unobtrusive approach had much promise.
Made much more sense than all these pop-ups and auto-roll videos everywhere that chase you away from every site.
Daniel Kochmański@richard google tomorrow [ai ads] fin
Enno Rehling@richard soon: only AI nonsense, with zero links to non-google sites. Search is dead, even Google now says so.
Kilroy_Was_HereInternet used to be faster for finding quality information, and real libraries, slower.
Now, I find it's vice-versa.
Simplicator
Dr. Bruce Simpson@Simplicator @richard Come back later. He's 'batin.
Waimea-Falls@richard ... although I do remember searching for thermal camouflage in the early 90's and getting the top answer of "wigs". Can you imagine an Abrams Battle tank wearing a wig?... (the 2nd top answer was "felafel"!...)
Pxl Phile
Adrian Egger@richard I can recommend Kagi, feels like Google used to.
fedops 💙💛
Anthony David@richard
I was at a retail store yesterday, and the floor sales person googled a question I had and started reading the AI review. I poimted out the store website below that and she agreed that the AI thing is totally in our faces.
It is time to fire up WAIS for the 21st century.
@adavid it certainly is. Once people become so dependent on AI for everyday use then who knows what rubbish we can be fed? Lemmings to the slaughter
Christoff, the human 
Jigen