Unfortunately, Google killed that search type. There are some browser extensions and bookmarklets that help, mostly by creating a very complicated search query that looks for specific things in the URL, but the discussion search is something I still mourn.
For what it's worth, my technique these days is to find a forum which has a large amount of discussion, then add a site filter to my Google query and only search that site. For something like product reviews, I can usually find the lesser-known products that don't show up on the SEO lists, at which point I now have a good keyword to find other enthusiast discussions online, which begins to open a lot of doors.
Unfortunately, I haven't quite refined the method for anything other than product reviews. At this point, I've started just using ChatGPT for factual questions before trying Google. :(
Of course, when I am aware of a specific forum which exists for that topic, site:... works well too.
(I also manage sites myself and they've been doing some heavy A/B testing the last couple of weeks, but we have to wait and see how big of an impact it will actually have.)
[0]: https://twitter.com/searchliaison/status/1656362551456993288
[1]: https://status.search.google.com/products/rGHU1u87FJnkP6W2Gw...
For people who don't want to click the Twitter link:
> We're also improving how we rank results in Search overall. Helpful information can often live in unexpected or hard-to-find places: a comment in a forum thread, a post on a little-known blog, or an article with unique expertise on a topic. Our helpful content ranking system will soon show more of these “hidden gems” on Search, particularly when we think they’ll improve the results.
I ditched Quora when they had a similar policy change as Reddit, which I disagreed with (honestly, I cannot recall what the kerfuffle was about, but I deleted my Quora account and never went back.) I hate when quora pops up in results.
But google has engineered themselves, deliberately so, into the "black-box behometh in the corner nobody can poke or question, and it just does its damn thing despite any of your riff-raff's ramblings"
Google checks it's bank account, hits the snooze button, and goes back to sleep
Maybe it's just a difference in phrasing. Promoting clean SEO companies is suppressing web forums.
The only way around this is for google to start making a white list of known good forums, but people get (understandably) really pissed when a company of google's size starts actively choosing winners and losers instead of just tuning their algorithm.
the problem is that google WANTs to promote forums because forums are reliable sources of truth, but with automation all they can do is look for subject authority markers (incoming link count, keywords, text references on other highly authoritative pages, etc)
SEO as an industry is about optimizing those markers to appear above "organic" results in a search page.
changing the markers only means the SEO industry will adjust to target the new priorities, but forum operators are always the last to optimize. it's a fundamentally unwinnable game
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I use OLD+RES for MY consumption and data density - if you dont know how to configure these together to create a much faster, and more aesthetically pleasing (to me) UX - then that sucks.
https://i.imgur.com/gdDawWz.png
https://i.imgur.com/jlTJGaT.png
So much more pleasant and quicker - especially with hover - I dont even need to click links
https://i.imgur.com/jDvjQwM.jpg
Which of the following do you find pleasing, its personal opinion, so choose what you like - I prefer old.
These are the same page, the only diff is old. vs www.
https://i.imgur.com/mnl5pCb.png <-- www
https://i.imgur.com/JfFZMQX.png <-- old
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So I just tested this again ; This is just btwn www.reddit and old.reddit, just now - notice the difference in content placement?
https://i.imgur.com/HtJhXqQ.png <-- www (notice the first story [ad])
https://i.imgur.com/xm6DAP3.png <-- old (ads more subtle - but still there) none of that click-puke in the UI though.