Click the Paw | Hacker News Reader

Click the Paw

google.com

254 pointsmetadat72 comments

Looks like it is only enabled when the interface is English. I do not see it by default here in Germany. But I get the paw when I add &hl=en to the url:

https://www.google.com/search?q=cat&hl=en

Oh, and it also works when I use the German word for "Cat" which is "Katze":

https://www.google.com/search?q=katze

Hm, I don't see it on Firefox for Android.

I got it on Firefox for android. Maybe locale matter as someone suggested.

Do you get German translations for the meows?

MIAU!

I didn't see it and mine is in French, I do see it with "Chat" and "Katze". If I search "Cat" the spot is taken by the company, not the animal, could it be something similar for you? I feel like that's the actual issue.

Another cool easter egg:

https://www.google.com/search?q=ingenuity

(click the animated helicopter)

Seeing the old Google bleed through is depressing sometimes.

Zerg rush is my favourite google easter egg.

https://elgoog.im/zergrush/

Sadly it seems to no longer do anything except bring up pages about the meme :(

Just updated the link

Totally forgot this one, not the easiest to play with a track pad!

There's a whole team at Google that does just this. The ROI is self-explanatory, well done Google.

Lots of these Easter eggs around - try searching for "joey tribbiani" and click the pizza.

This happens with all the six characters of FRIENDS.

Link for lazy people: https://www.google.com/search?q=%22joey+tribbiani%22

I tried "dog" but seems there's no easter egg for it.. do you know of any other good ones?

Dog works for me! Same thing, slightly different paws.

I'm not sure why this sort of frivolous bloat was ever approved by Google management. This sort of childish nonsense is completely unprofessional.

The cat one is good, though.

> Same thing, slightly different paws.

I deduce you've had your sound off this whole time.

Try "dog animal"

https://www.google.com/search?q=dog+animal

It works!

Both "dog" and "dogs" work for me

Enjoy: https://searchengineland.com/the-big-list-of-google-easter-e...

Sadly a lot of these no longer seem to work.

They must have skipped the integration tests.

You can see many of the removed ones at https://elgoog.im

Or maybe they were removed because the integration test failed and no one felt like fixing it so they just axed it.

More complete list: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Google_Easter_eggs

“dog” didn’t work the first time i searched. Showed me movies. So I believe google’s personalized search results is the culprit. Searching for “dog animal” works as mentioned by another post. Now “dog” works too.

No paw here, do I have to be in the US?

Exists in Australia too, has for a few days.

It should be on the right hand side of the page across from the text "Cat<br>Animal".

Japanese users (including those with no cookies whose request headers say they only speak American English) get a knowledge panel for Caterpillar Inc. if they search for "cat." I can see the Cat (Animal) knowledge panel by searching for "cat animal" though. Thanks!

Worked for me, not in the US

It works for me if I search for Cat, but if I search for the Danish Kat it doesn't. wait, scratch that, it did work it just seemed to be a loading issue. (I was confused why it wouldn't work given that it had the initial animation showing the cat paw clicking to get you to do it)

FF Developer on a lousy Windows thinkpad.

Dog also worked for me :)

I also tried cattle, deer and chicken, none worked. I guess they're still in the backlog.

Check killedbygoogle first

Useful to keep a child distracted for a few minutes.

why would you need to keep a child distracted for just a few minutes?

Don’t have kids huh?

For just a few minutes. Typically, owners of kids have them for longer than that. If you had kids of your own, you'd understand why.

Owners of kids?

Road-trips are accomplished by paying good money for distractions in minute by minute blocks of time…

I do find the layer over the page being set so the cat now paws at what you click on and you have to click the X to close it somewhat passing the point of being amusing to being annoying. But I guess that's the part that allows you to really keep the child distracted.

on edit: what does no one else have this experience, why the multiple downvotes? or do you have the overlay, and you think it is so wonderful one should be overjoyed and not annoyed?

The performance of this is abysmal, which is pretty interesting and I would expect more from Google.

I was so upset about the Android iMessage crying yesterday this completely eliminated my sadness

Well, seeing this in the light of recent news is kinda ... hilarious?

I was thinking the same. Is this what sundar was talking about?

This happens with all the six main characters of FRIENDS.

yes, but not with Chanandler Bong

kinda funny if you spam click it also.

(only works in desktop mode.)

works on mobile for me.

? I see cat in 3D

The easter egg doesn't seem to work on mobile (or maybe from outside the US?), but as someone who hasn't used google.com for quite a while, what's remarkable to me is how much the landing SERP has changed since the simple list-of-links design of the early days. And not in a good way. I have some time, so rant incoming...

From top to bottom, here's what I see for "cat":

0. To start, that annoying full-screen cookie consent form. At least it has a "Reject all" button now, so it's relatively quick to dismiss.

1. A full-screen business summary for Caterpillar, including contact, revenue, and other less important information, followed by their site link. Useful, I guess.

2. Six thumbnail images of cats with a link to view all images. Very relevant, makes sense, but I would go to Image Search if I wanted to see images.

3. A map with some vaguely relevant locations and a link to view more map results. Why is this on the SERP? Again, if I wanted to search for locations, I'd go directly to Maps.

4. Some "other questions from users" section about the CAT brand. Huh? My search term wasn't a question, so why is this here? And why would I care about _other_ questions than the one I searched for? And, most importantly, why is this on the SERP?? Bafflingly bad design, context, presentation...

5. A couple of out of place, but presumably sponsored, links to a CAT phones site and a Spanish university site. Weird seeing this in a standalone section, but it's better than having sponsored links mixed in with native results.

6. An "other people also searched for" section with some CAT brand search links. Why would I care what other people searched for? Feels sponsored as well.

7. FINALLY a list of search results, with a grand total of 6 links, and some are even relevant.

8. I shit you not, ANOTHER "other questions from users" section, with even more random CAT brand questions. W. T. F.

9. A "related searches" section, that's pretty much the same as "other people also searched for". But...ytho?

10. Some ads to purchase CAT phones, with prices and thumbnails. Ah, no surprise, it's what Google does best.

11. An infinitely scrolling list of results, mixed with sponsored links. Broken up by the same ad section as above, and then more results, and more ads... Ad infinitum. Ah no, there's actually an end with a "show more" link. We can still page through the results, that's great.

What an absolutely hostile user experience. I mean, I get that I'm not the customer and that Google wants to bombard me with ads, but this is borderline unusable. I'm quite happy using SearX and occasionally DDG, but frankly it doesn't take much to improve on Google's UX.

Relax.

From another post on the HN homepage: 'Too many employees, but few work': Pichai, Zuckerberg sound the alarm

https://www.business-standard.com/article/international/too-...

But for google they should have done it for all animals by now. They are way behind schedule only cat and dog is done. /s

So.. about that hiring freeze/slowed revenue growth/etc. Glad to see they still have bandwidth for this kind of stuff (not sarcasm)

The people getting fired are the ones who stopped engineers from doing this sort of thing. I remember in university you'd have job adds for google inside under the hood implementation details where only students/hackers would look. Those disappeared as quickly as pointy haired bosses showed up there.

I wonder if those type of ads attracts certain type of engineers, which were desirable during the rapid growth period of the company, only to become liabilities later on when they failed to adapt with the business's everchanging objectives and KPIs.

Disclaimer: Not an engineer, but a people manager.

No idea. Google in 2005 used to attract the smart weird people. By 2015 everyone smart and weird I knew there was yelling from the rooftops to not work for them.

I don't know if that will be true, unfortunately.

Can we get the timer back?

They don’t lack for developer bandwidth. They lack direction and any semblance of focus beyond protecting ad revenue.

"Too many employees, but few work"

I don't think this comment could be better timed than today. I agree. That said, the reason these people worked on this is because they were probably mis-guided with priorities and red tapes in other areas...

The best designed thing google has put out in at least the last 5 years

My understanding is these are usually made by interns as a fun project that has a low impact and can be scuttled without consequence if the code becomes difficult to maintain. There are a bunch of these types of Easter eggs that no longer work.

i don't understand how they expect anyone to trust them and rely on these cat paws if they could be EOL at any moment in favor of some other easter egg

relying on a catspaw is probably documented as "don't do that" from the book of cons, long con, "the sting" and "paper moon"

the LAST THING YOU ARE MEANT TO DO is rely on the catspaw. you just became the mark.

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