+1’s: the right recommendations right when you want them—in your search results

As well as a browser add-on (don't Google already have something similar to this?), I think it is more than likely that we'll see +1 buttons on web pages themselves (similar to Twitter tweet and Facebook like buttons), although obviously not every page will have this.

Ideally, I would buy through a Google service (Checkout) and then Google would provide me opportunities to rate the business after the sale. These ratings could affect an ad's quality score. Done right, this would allow Google to introduce me to the businesses most likely to satisfy me. Google would become more of a trusted advisor to searchers rather than just another advertising company.

You're looking for utility; whereas, I believe they are taking a pro-active step against Facebook's newly awarded patents on "social search."

Regarding utility: it's Google, so they'll iterate...

Regarding competition: it's launched and available to the public now!

When Facebook acquired Friendster.com, this also gave control over lucrative patents that were awarded this year and last year.

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2351407

+1 doesn't do that. It's not immediately apparent what it's for, and it offers no incentive for use without knowing what it is. The icon itself doesn't tell you anything. "What is it, some kind of movie?" A simple thumbs up would have been much simpler, much more intuitive, and likely to gain greater traction. A simple note under the search bar saying, "Find what you were looking for? Give it the thumbs up and help us deliver better results" would likely have led to much higher usage. The average user doesn't need to know what it's being used for. Calling it "social" doesn't help in this context, because nobody thinks of social when they think of Google. Even telling people it would be shared with their email contacts is a terrible idea - email is for work and family, not messing around with friends. Just say that it's to help improve Search and reduce spam, and people will go along with it.

It's not the bookmarking that will take place during search time. It's the discovery!

If Google wants to be more persistent, they could easily use their Android and Chrome platforms to do it :)

No doubt a toolbar and chrome addon is on it's way. Even in search with previews and HTML5 being able to tag info as summary to display directly in the search screen you may even use it in search more than you think. No reason why they can't start tying in reviews on google places and checkout as you suggest

These people see the same results again and again, and they only have to click +1 once.

1. they're trying to match the 'like' button. So you '+1' something, it goes in your profile and your friends can see it. It also would surprise me if there weren't a widget made available to publishers, so viewers of a source article could see if their friends '+1'd it.

2. They'll be able to use '+1' score as a factor in search result weighting along the lines you're suggesting. While they may still weight toward +1s from your social circle, this being Google, I doubt they'll settle for the simplest statistical use of the data.

As for the browsing flow problem -- i.e. how often are you looking at google search results after you determine the result is good -- I'd be surprised if the seemingly inevitable package for site owners didn't allowing people to '+1' directly at the source.

If people use this, I see how it could be useful.

From the example, what you see is "Laura Delaney +1'd this", so at the very least you can evaluate the "+1" based on what you know about Laura.

Better still would be if they include Laura's name because she's +1'd (what an awkward phrase) a lot of cooking results, maybe in proportion to links on other topics.

I think it could work, as long as it's not gamed into uselessness.

More importantly, while having frequent minor upgrades on a wide variety of 'beta' software services gives some a feeling that 'nothing is ever finished,' it means that Google is not fighting for brand recognition with its products in most markets. Although there are several products, such as Sketchup, which are offered 'by Google' but have a separate brand, they're generally aimed at a small niche. Orkut is the only product I can think of that has a really large market (in Brazil) but is not obviously Google-branded in the way that Google Earth or Gmail are.

'Microsoft search' obviously wasn't working so they needed something different and settled on 'Bing!' - though they missed a trick by not using a variety of happy-sounding audio icons in the TV commercials and (optionally!) on the product itself. Intel's signature 'tune' has been a very successful element of their brand, and Microsoft had an opportunity to positively extend the host brand but instead opted to develop a new one in purely verbal terms. Their marketing team did a fairly good job - it could have become an embarrassing joke if they had not - but this year they're doing the same thing with the new slogan of 'to the cloud!' And of course, every 3-4 years they have to remind the general public that their computers are mostly running Windows.

You get the impression that Microsoft is vaguely embarrassed by its own name and its 1980s literalism, and so it hides behind a variety of hipper-sounding product offerings like an awkward parent at a youth club. Google is colorful and seemingly omnipresent, Apple is a healthy fruit with an iBrand, and IBM sounds so important that a quarter of the country probably thinks its part of the government. Yahoo...well, this says everything I feel about Yahoo's brand management: http://techcrunch.com/2008/08/25/yahoos-404-at-giants-stadiu... It's been there for years now, and I still snicker every single time I watch a Giants game. OK, only 1% of the public may be amused by such things, but the other 99% notice the reactions of the people who build/run/fix their computers, much as people listen to auto mechanics more closely than auto salesmen. that company is in dire, dire need of a brand makeover.

The you're connected to this person thing, however, has worked out quite well for me. A lot of the time, I'm looking for something that someone I follow on Twitter shared - and it just bubbles up for me. I'm a fan.

Plus, I don't necessarily have all that much in common with my friends, but if Google can categorize me and say "oh, people with similar interests as you liked this", that's likely much more relevant. This isn't to say Facebook couldn't do something similar, I just feel like this is much more up Google's alley.

1) Is Blockbuster Movie any good?

Here the opinions of your friends might be more valuable to you, as valuable to you, or less valuable to you, depending on how important it is to you to have the same taste as your friends or whether you consider their movie tastes similar to your own.

2) Courtship rituals of early-modern spain

Here the opinions of your friends are almost certainly less relevant than that of a bot, unless you run in a very niche circle.

3) Directions to Skyline Chili

Here the bot is almost definitely a better choice than your friends.

Lastly, you always have to fall back to a bot because most searches are not going to have many results that friends have actively curated. So bots will continually have a place in search, and I would argue will because more important over time, as they become smarter.