Is it just me, or is Google really starting to suck?

[Liberal Veteran]

Google used to be the shit, but lately it seems like about anything you type into google brings you 18 pages of CRAP and people selling CRAP instead of real information.

[kostya]

1. I've noticed the same thing. They are taking us for granted while

they develop new markets. I hear they have a great new search engine for academicians that searchs on published research, though. _ K

[autorank]

2. Google has sucked for a while. Needs competition. It's like MS.

[ixion]

3. I've noticed that, too

You have to dig through more garbage to find the gem you're looking for.

[Sanity Claws]

4. You can still have fun with Google

Enter "worst president ever" and see what comes up.

As for all the commercial sites when you want info, it's a pain, but I usually skip over them and look for "org" or "edu" sites among the google hits to find something informative.

[Willy Wonka]

5. A little Google trick..

If you are looking for something specific, you might want to put in quotations like this:

"Debt Consolidation" commerical (narrows it down to the stuff you want)

or "network card" detection

etc.

Nifty stuff.

[progressoid]

6. I've been pretty dissapointed in Google news lately too

I suppose it's because of their ranking system.

[yvr girl]

14. try Vivisimo

It's a clustering search engine.

It's not all googles fault. The world wide web is growing everyday, more sites = more crap.

[kittycat1164]

17. I use vivisimo too

have for at least a year. I liked it better before clusty, though. Guess they had to get cute. :eyes:

[progressoid]

18. Thanks, I'll give it a whirl

[Neoma]

7. Altavisa!

www.Altavisa.com

the best!

[KDLarsen]

8. Not so much Googles fault..

.. but the Website developers who are using trick that exploit the way google works. Even DU have been doing it with the "Worst President Ever" google-bombing.

[DS1]

9. Too much unorganized data or too many people make all systems start to

suck. ;-)

OMG

[w4rma]

10. It's tough to defend against manipulation of search engines by folks.

Particularly folks who are trying to sell you something.

Just like a democracy requires constant vigilance, so do search engines. The folks at Google are letting down their guard.

[MasonJar]

11. I believe I read that the Goggle owners are fundies.

[Bridget Burke]

19. Is there a link to that information?

"I believe I read" is a bit vague.....

[amazona]

12. yeah I need another search engine

I couldn't even find a roasting chicken recipe today by searching google. What the hey?

[miss_kitty]

13. I don't know I use Yahoo! nt

[Skittles]

15. I've noticed it too

have had to use Yahoo a few times

[redqueen]

16. I haven't noticed any increased suckitude

but I really don't pay that much attention... :shrug:

[davis_islander]

20. Blog Clog!

They need to segregate the blogs into a separate area of Google. Every time I'm researching something, I have to wade through dozens of these vanity sites to get to a real resource.

[WritersBlock]

21. It ain't just you.

I was looking for something earlier today, and almost the entire first page of results consisted of those commercial search engine sites. I HATE those things.