Hacker News Reader

> The example list given just looks a lot like spam when you squint.

I had to do some deep breathing before responding (creator of Shepherd here) :)

When I squint while reading a Pulitzer Prize-winning book, it looks like every other book with words everywhere.

When my wife really squints, she says I "look" like Brad Pitt.

I say these things with humor... as the core of what Google is supposed to do is determine what is good content and what is spam.

Is that hard?

Yes, but you have a lot of smart people and are swimming in money.

The point here, and with all the other posts by indie publishers, is that Google has destroyed them while elevating much worse results (they used to rank just fine along with other accurate results). I am just one example of many, and sadly better than most because books are a passion and not that commercial. For indie websites scientifically reviewing air purification systems, they are destroyed, and now you just get Forbes spam where nobody reviewed it.

My suggestion for Google is to stop squinting :)

> with all the other posts by indie publishers, is that Google has destroyed them while elevating much worse results

While I agree with your overall premise, some of this seems very subjective, re: "much worse results". For example, in your post when you list the pages outranking your site for "best books on Battle of Midway", you say this about being outranked by a forum thread on BoardGameGeek:

"A 2010 post on a Board Game forum asking for good books about the Battle of Midway. Really Google?"

BoardGameGeek is pretty much the most important site for the entire board game / tabletop gaming hobby. It's been around for 25 years, and it is most definitely part of the independent web. The thread in question is on BGG's main wargaming forum; wargaming has been a thing for many decades and has significant crossover among officers of the military / ex-military. The thread includes a lot of organic book recommendations from real people, with no affiliate links.

Despite the thread being from 2010, I would expect this page absolutely should rank pretty well for this search query! So why the "Really Google?" snark, especially when describing a fellow independent web site?

Yeah, it's hard to take OP seriously when it just comes across as sour grapes. Especially when their substack just seems to be a means to serve affiliate links.

Great question, so the substack has zero affiliate links :)

The website is partially funded through affiliate links, as that pays for about 50% of our server and software costs each month.

Let me know if you have any questions on our business model, its a tough one and outline here: https://support.shepherd.com/hc/en-us/articles/4406508624913...

I'm sad to see Google degrade, but I get plenty of traffic from other sources and we have a lot of direct traffic. My intense hope is that Google can fix themselves but given what we are seeing on the indie web that does not seem to be the case...

It isn't the worst result for sure; it is probably the strongest result on the page beyond the one ahead of it. But it is 14 years old and not the best source in this situation.

Can you read the entire post? I go through each of the top 10, the board game post was ranked 9th.

> it is 14 years old

Yes, but the Battle of Midway was 82 years ago, and it stands to reason that many good books on the battle already existed 14 years ago.

> and not the best source in this situation

That's subjective, which was one point I was trying to make in my comment.

> Can you read the entire post?

I did. I was compelled to comment due to your "Really Google?" snark, combined with the additional overwhelming snark in your comment upthread, when you're responding to a Googler who is just trying to help you.

And now you're here asking me if I read your entire post, which is explicitly against the HN guidelines. ("Please don't comment on whether someone read an article.") I have more thoughts on the topic of ranking, but it really doesn't seem worthwhile to comment further given the tone of these responses!

Hah, I like a little humor, but it doesn't sound like we are not a personality match so yes, I do recommend you skip it :)

The Googler wasn't helping in anyway; in fact, it is clear they don't even understand search with such odd concepts such as "looks a lot like spam when you squint." And a total misunderstanding of what is happening since they don't work in the search department.

btw, this might be helpful as it goes deep on the problem, and why this is a problem that Google also recognizes is hurting a TON of indie publishers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_6FqA87Lfc

> SEO, and people getting annoyed at not ranking, has been a thing for 25+ years, I don't think this instance is any different.

"People have always complained about X" is always a bad argument: it's entirely possible that X has gotten much worse, and yes, there were complaints before and after.

In this case, there is a very loud chorus of people saying Google has gotten much worse in the last few years, and it certainly matches my experience.

> The author says that a Bookshop.org list they created that links back to Shepherd is ranking #2, and this kinda makes sense to me. Bookshop.org sells the books, it makes sense that would rank above a site that only links to (and makes money from) sites that sell books.

In other words google is giving preference to a site that probably pays them for ads to a site that is effectively a competitor (since the site would make revenue from affiliate links that google might have gotten from ads, especially if the user liked the site and went directly there for future book recommendations).

Also, if I am searching for the "best" of something, I want something with commentary, not a list from a vendor without relevant information for choosing the right product.

Do you use Google anymore? It has gotten so bad, I regularly can't find things on it anymore, no matter how I search for things it will keep showing the same results. You seem to have blinders on. How do you explain the site getting less and less traffic over time?

If they wanted to fix it they would. Most likely someone came up with the great idea of "Hey if search sucks, some losers will pay for AI hoping that fixes it, we are so smart"

I don't now if the bad results are because no one has written about the topic I want to learn or google search results are just terrible..

I do, and I don't find it too bad. I switched from DDG back to Google recently because I realised I had to use !g on most of my searches.

One day I tried a Google search and noticed that everything "above the fold" on the first page was either a Google property, an advertisement, or both.

I stopped using Google for web search, but I still use it for Google search.

Part of me wonders if the ad market is just radically different on Google in the US or other parts of the world, or if I just make very non-commercial searches. I don't see many ads, unless I'm actively going to Google Shopping essentially in search of them.

I do see the Google info box style results, but I find these to be one of the most useful parts and it's one of the reasons I like using Google for things that are basic facts, media fact finding (like "who was that person in that show" style queries), etc.

In my experience (American), the top 1-4 results are ads/sponsored links. Sometimes, very relevant to the search. Most of the time, not what I'm looking for.

I only use google search on my phone because I have a pixel, and the google searchbar is so well integrated into the launcher. If I don't like the results, I can just open a new tab and the default search is DuckDuckGo. Besides the ads, I'd say the searches are usually the same quality.

I switched to Kagi about 3 months ago, and to ChatGPT for a lot of info searches.

I have not used Google for a couple of years (with the exception of Streetview where they do not have any competition at all). So I cannot comment on the quality of their search results. They are a close to monopolist / duopolist / oligopolist in too many areas. Ethically such a bad company that I don't want to touch them with a stick. Unfortunately masses don't understand that and contine to use them. And engineers are greedy enough to work for the evil.

iOS has a streetview alternative.

I personally hardly ever use any version of streetview because I don’t feel the need to so forgive me if I am missing what’s so great about Google’s version.

Where did you find a streetview alternative? It's not in the Maps app from what I can see.

your comment made me remember about this post:

- Google made me ruin a perfectly good website (2023) / https://theluddite.org/#!post/google-ads

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40184673 (HN comments)

I'm specifically thinking about this line:

> It's a list of affiliate links to buy products, and there are many HN threads talking about the abundance of affiliate link aggregators being a blight on the web.

This is a pattern that was made hugely popular specifically by google, by the way

(That's not what dearth means.)

portmanteau of "dithering" and "blight" and "earth"

Whoops, thanks.

Also, to add to this...

One idea I've had is that it would be interesting if Google created a webmaster partner program to help build the web they want to see. Webmasters could join and embed Google's code into their website, and Google could get access to engagement stats and anything else to help them determine positive reactions by users (instead of pretending they are not pulling it from Chrome - see DOJ trial).

At YouTube, Google does a great job of helping creators, telling them specifically what they want, and promoting high-quality content that people love.

I'd love to see Google get the data they need so they can do that.

Is this not literally what Google Analytics is? I'm not sure if they're using it for everything you're hoping to have, but it seems like it basically performs that function.

They they are not allowed to use the data... which seems weird given Chrome and DOJ details. But I've never seen any details of them using it, and every statement is they don't use it.

YouTube is flooded with AI narrated shorts content. Are you experiencing a different reality? It seems like when I try to venture out of my bubble I'm getting AI videos (not about the topic but zero effort prompt daisy chaining) now even outside of shorts (that I wish I could disable completely, I never mean to hit the button).

Weird, I've gotten nothing like that but I never do shorts since they are just sugar and no filling.

I absolutely hate YT shorts. Unfortunately all of my social circle are unmedicated ADHDers who live on hyper short form content. If a YT video is less than 15 minutes I just won't watch it.

Honest question: Would you say Google Search is getting better and better?