When Google Disappoints

January 15, 2010

when google dissapoints As a G2 [second generation child of not one but two holocaust victims and survivors] I am deeply disappointed by seeing these types of results in Google Suggest.

This function is similar to “Did you mean” that provides alternatives for your query while you type, the difference is that this tool works in real time. By suggesting more detailed searches directly, Google Suggest can make your searches more convenient and efficient without having to reformulate your query.

But if you look a little beyond the use officially promoted and their obvious utility, you can see a powerful tool to identify which keywords and phrases most popular (at the time) on Google, something that marketers of all search engines always dreamed.

So does this mean that Holocaust deniers outweigh truthers searches? The travesty and tragedy that occurred before and during WWII was systematic and held in the following places, none of which show in the results.

Concentration and Extermination camps:

Auschwitz-Birkenau · Bełżec · Bergen-Belsen · Bogdanovka · Buchenwald · Chełmno · Dachau · Gross-Rosen · Herzogenbusch · Janowska · Jasenovac · Kaiserwald · Majdanek · Maly Trostenets · Mauthausen-Gusen · Neuengamme · Ravensbrück · Sachsenhausen · Sajmište · Salaspils · Sobibór · Stutthof · Theresienstadt · Treblinka · Uckermark · Warsaw

Concentration and Extermination camps:

I could even have dealt with as search suggest results.

Jews in Nazi Germany (1933–1939)

Pogroms: Kristallnacht · Bucharest · Dorohoi · Iaşi · Kaunas · Jedwabne · Lviv (Lvov)

Ghettos: Budapest · Lublin · Lviv · Łódź · Kraków · Kovno · Minsk · Warsaw · Vilna · (List)

Einsatzgruppen: Babi Yar · Rumbula · Ponary · Odessa · Erntefest · Ninth Fort

Final Solution: Wannsee · Operation Reinhard · Holocaust trains · Extermination camps · Madagascar Plan

what google should show

I find these results particularly disturbing after Googles recent announcement to exit the Chinese search market, and the human rights abuse issues Chinese dissidents face. So I decided to make a Google Suggest list of my own. Google may have as a corporate mandate “do no evil” but sometimes they are just ugly

Although not immediately obvious Google Suggest needs to talk to the Google home page to offer suggestions as you type. And whatever you type is controlled by Google’s privacy policies. However, Google Suggest does not base its suggestions on your personal searches, not in your search history.

Here is where the SEO in me comes out. How is it that Google can return fairly accurate [once again Wikipedia comes up #1 in the results page SERP's], but this information is not tied into Google Suggest for ‘fair and balanced’ results. If Google Suggest trends popular search queries why do SERP’s not mimic the queries as these would be most relevant to a user and not based on a linking strategy algorithms.

Additionally, Google does not reveal the reference time range for the total number of searches that are displayed next to each suggestion. For search engine marketers the KPI is to measure the relative difference between possible alternatives.

Tags: Google Suggest

AlanBleiweiss

I'd like to present an alternative view. Not against the holocaust, mind you. But against the notion that what you found is necessarily something to be overly concerned with. This is NOT to devalue or de-emphasize the epic tragedy that was the holocaust. Here's the reality. The holocaust is taught as a factual part of history in schools. Intelligent, rational humans know it happened. So from this perspective, it makes sense that the vast majority of searches using that specific combination of words, "holocaust is" are going to be the psychotic fringe. With all due respect, when typing in the word holocaust, the suggestions that I get all paint a different picture than you paint. It's only when you add "is". Why would you think that most people would add the word "is" into such a search? When typing "the holocaust", 8 of the ten suggestions are not that fringe either, though two are. This, I believe shows that while there are always sick, twisted or otherwise deranged people, the vast majority of humanity is better than that.And it's not up to Google to get into the "fair and balanced" of search results. They already go way too far in making decisions for us. Let's not encourage them to get into moral and ethical decisions at this level on this topic. Instead, how about adding more content in new ways about what really happened? In that content, focus on the wack-job keywords and offering the truth to that content. So the next time some twisted individual searches for such crap, they're more likely to get the real story.Just a suggestion.

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Sue Densmore

I always thought Google suggest was created from previous searches. So I would have assumed, before reasing this post, that more people searched for these suggested terms than the real story.

I am sad about these suggestions either way. And, you're right, it is inconsistent with the stand they're taking with China.

Rachel Levy

Wow, that IS a shame. But, as you know very well, it's because the denier sites are getting more traffic than the ones that are factual. That's the real shame... the dissenters have more power with Google.

Tweets that mention When Google Dissapoints | Boston Media Domain -- Topsy.com says:

January 16, 2010 at 12:35 am

[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Rachel Levy, Jeff Selig and Jeff Selig, Nadav Doron. Nadav Doron said: RT @bostonmarketer: Commented (about Google and Holocaust) RT @bostonmarketer @schoolmarketer you should read this post http://j.mp/7UAIfg [...]

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