Reply to: Google

[Sysman]

HotBot and AltaVista.

Raves from the grave.

Altavista is still there

I couldn't resist putting in a search for FORTRAN...

[Sysman]

Yep, I did that straightaway as the search results were totally different to those I got before and it then 'destroyed' a number of my settings such as opening search results in a new window...

It started working here in Chocolate Land yesterday, and you don't need to be logged in. Typing a single "a" comes up with the likes of Apple and Amazon (3 flavours of), so my guess is that they are picking the big payers.

[NickFitz]

You can try a new search engine just by typing it into your browser... you can even find it by typing the name into Google.

Yahoo! handles many hundreds of thousands of searches for "Yahoo" every day.

Some people seem to find it easier to get to Yahoo! Mail or whatever by going to Yahoo! and searching for "Yahoo", even though the link to whatever service they are seeking was right there on the page they searched from. I have no doubt that many of those users get to Yahoo! to carry out that search by first searching for "Yahoo" on Google.

There was absolute mayhem back in February when ReadWriteWeb published an article that briefly became the first Google result for "facebook login"

Still, there's an important lesson there: you need to understand your users, and you are not your users.

[AtW]

Using Bing or whatever works very similar to Google.

It's like changing from Coke to Pepsi - impossible.

[d000hg]

It's the other side of the coin - they are a monopoly for users same as ze Windows.

No they're not. Changing from Windows is hard, you need to invest lots of time just installing a new OS let alone knowing how it works. You can try a new search engine just by typing it into your browser... you can even find it by typing the name into Google. Using Bing or whatever works very similar to Google.

[AtW]

But as users of the service, this is not the case.

It's the other side of the coin - they are a monopoly for users same as ze Windows.

[d000hg]

I suppose for advertisers, it's fair to say Google has a monopoly in that you can't afford not to optimise for Google. But as users of the service, this is not the case.

[AtW]

Google is not a monopoly like Windows is. Google has the majority share of searching in the western world but Yahoo/Bing are active. And in other countries Google is NOT even the main player.

In the UK Google accounts for 90% of searches, now with that "instant" tulip that creates 3-5 more searches per same proper search they will surely go up to 99.99% - stock market is going to love it!

[d000hg]

Google Instant a potential bonanza for search scams

"This new technology can potentially improve existing Blackhat SEO campaigns," Correll warns. "We know for a fact that most Blackhat SEO campaigns automatically query Google’s trending topic results and now it seems that Google Instant will be suggesting those trending phrases (verbatim), potentially putting millions of victims directly in cyber criminals' cross hairs."
...
Typing in "anti-virus" in Google, with the new real-time search technology enabled, returned Antivir Solution Pro, a well-known scareware pathogen, in a prominent position among the suggested search terms

[darmstadt]

You can turn it off if you don't like it. Look at the screenshot I posted earlier in the thread, where the topmost arrow is pointing to "Instant is on" - click on that and turn it off

Yep, I did that straightaway as the search results were totally different to those I got before and it then 'destroyed' a number of my settings such as opening search results in a new window...

[d000hg]

They are a monopoly like Microsoft was with Windows - forcing users to do certain things for their own benefit by leveraging monopoly will sooner or later end up where Microsoft did.

What, really rich and powerful?

Google is not a monopoly like Windows is. Google has the majority share of searching in the western world but Yahoo/Bing are active. And in other countries Google is NOT even the main player.

Changing your OS is a big hassle, changing your search engine isn't.

[cailin maith]

You can turn it off if you don't like it. Look at the screenshot I posted earlier in the thread, where the topmost arrow is pointing to "Instant is on" - click on that and turn it off

Thank you!

[AtW]

They also allow you the choice to not use their site at all.

They are a monopoly like Microsoft was with Windows - forcing users to do certain things for their own benefit by leveraging monopoly will sooner or later end up where Microsoft did.

[d000hg]

Yes, that was very kind of Google to allow this possibility, I wish they did the same for ******* left nav bar

They also allow you the choice to not use their site at all. Wouldn't you be better user Yandex?

[AtW]

You can turn it off if you don't like it.

Yes, that was very kind of Google to allow this possibility, I wish they did the same for ******* left nav bar