Comments on: Google vs. Innovation http://www.johnon.com/432/google-anticompetitive.html I think there's an opinion on that subject lying around here somewhere.... Wed, 08 Feb 2012 05:32:23 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.0.7 by: Dan http://www.johnon.com/432/google-anticompetitive.html#comment-66581 Thu, 22 Nov 2007 06:28:17 +0000 http://www.johnon.com/432/google-anticompetitive.html#comment-66581 Hi, A lot of 'parking pages' these days are not a bad experience for most Internet searches. Now this is a BAD Internet search experience for someone looking for 'ever' or ever.com http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=ever&btnG=Google Search When I look at almost any Google results page...all I see is a bad PPC landing page with ads and 1 or 2 'Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia' results in the top 1-4 spots of the 'actual' part of Google thats suppose to be a Internet search engine. If I want results from Wikipedia...I would just go there. Google search has become nothing more than... one big AD aggregator...which to me... has nothing at all to do with Internet search. Google has been so busy trying to become 'MSapplegoo'... that internet search is not evolving at all. Because everyone has the additude... 'thats just the way it is'. IMHO As with anything...only time will tell. Peace! Dan Hi,

A lot of ‘parking pages’ these days are not a bad experience for most Internet searches.

Now this is a BAD Internet search experience for someone looking for ‘ever’ or ever.com
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=ever&btnG=Google Search

When I look at almost any Google results page…all I see is a bad PPC landing page with ads and 1 or 2 ‘Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia’ results in the top 1-4 spots of the ‘actual’ part of Google thats suppose to be a Internet search engine.

If I want results from Wikipedia…I would just go there.

Google search has become nothing more than… one big AD aggregator…which to me… has nothing at all to do with Internet search.

Google has been so busy trying to become ‘MSapplegoo’… that internet search is not evolving at all.

Because everyone has the additude… ‘thats just the way it is’.

IMHO

As with anything…only time will tell.

Peace!
Dan

]]> by: Jamie http://www.johnon.com/432/google-anticompetitive.html#comment-65521 Mon, 19 Nov 2007 19:51:02 +0000 http://www.johnon.com/432/google-anticompetitive.html#comment-65521 @ MAtt - you say users don't usually like parked domains, yet the CTR on many parked pages is MILES better than a typical adwords listing. In fact, Google reps are telling agencies that they should not pull the parked pages from their basked of sites in the content network because the parked sites convert so well. So I'm having trouble squaring that with your stance on parked pages... @ MAtt - you say users don’t usually like parked domains, yet the CTR on many parked pages is MILES better than a typical adwords listing. In fact, Google reps are telling agencies that they should not pull the parked pages from their basked of sites in the content network because the parked sites convert so well. So I’m having trouble squaring that with your stance on parked pages…

]]> by: Matt Cutts http://www.johnon.com/432/google-anticompetitive.html#comment-65198 Mon, 19 Nov 2007 06:46:20 +0000 http://www.johnon.com/432/google-anticompetitive.html#comment-65198 All I know is that users usually don't like parked domains, and lots of them type in things like seatac.com and then complain if they don't get the airport. :) All I know is that users usually don’t like parked domains, and lots of them type in things like seatac.com and then complain if they don’t get the airport. :)

]]> by: john andrews http://www.johnon.com/432/google-anticompetitive.html#comment-65059 Sun, 18 Nov 2007 22:56:04 +0000 http://www.johnon.com/432/google-anticompetitive.html#comment-65059 Very interesting, Matt. Google imparts intent, yes, but as an Engineer I wonder if the slippery slope of editorializing might be avoided via the "general solution". In other words, as long as you choose to "judge" in cases such as described, you create opportunity for problems the market cannot correct (and thus, PR problems for Google). Markets can correct for obviously mismatched domain names. In the seatac.com example, I agree that domain should be for seatac airport. You chose a case of no ambiguity - there is nothing publishable for seatac.com more relevant than seatac's airport. But there could be... Seatac is a city. Were Seatac.com a city directory, how would you decide what was most relevant? Presumably you would let the market decide between www.portseattle.org/seatac/ and seatac.com, based on actual use (in a perfect world)? From what I see seatac.com has very targeted links on it now for airport parking and travel etc. Aside from no link to the Port of Seattle, not too shabby a user experience? As Google steps in an makes these judgements as to whether or not seatac.com is relevant for a search of "seatac.com", Google takes on responsibility. Google also insulates the Port of Seattle (in this case) from the market forces they are supposed to manage -- if seatac.com is so perfectly relevant for them, why didn't or don't they use it? Is Google inhibiting market liquidity in the domain space by editorializing like this? And if Google didn't do this, how long before we would achieve steady state with perfect-match domains resolving to perfect content? To be fair, I agree that if Google always ranked poorly-done parked pages, they would never go away nor improve. Surely you have click data I don't have to support market-driven relevance? Very interesting, Matt. Google imparts intent, yes, but as an Engineer I wonder if the slippery slope of editorializing might be avoided via the “general solution”. In other words, as long as you choose to “judge” in cases such as described, you create opportunity for problems the market cannot correct (and thus, PR problems for Google). Markets can correct for obviously mismatched domain names.

In the seatac.com example, I agree that domain should be for seatac airport. You chose a case of no ambiguity - there is nothing publishable for seatac.com more relevant than seatac’s airport. But there could be… Seatac is a city. Were Seatac.com a city directory, how would you decide what was most relevant? Presumably you would let the market decide between www.portseattle.org/seatac/ and seatac.com, based on actual use (in a perfect world)? From what I see seatac.com has very targeted links on it now for airport parking and travel etc. Aside from no link to the Port of Seattle, not too shabby a user experience?

As Google steps in an makes these judgements as to whether or not seatac.com is relevant for a search of “seatac.com”, Google takes on responsibility. Google also insulates the Port of Seattle (in this case) from the market forces they are supposed to manage — if seatac.com is so perfectly relevant for them, why didn’t or don’t they use it? Is Google inhibiting market liquidity in the domain space by editorializing like this? And if Google didn’t do this, how long before we would achieve steady state with perfect-match domains resolving to perfect content?

To be fair, I agree that if Google always ranked poorly-done parked pages, they would never go away nor improve. Surely you have click data I don’t have to support market-driven relevance?

]]> by: Matt Cutts http://www.johnon.com/432/google-anticompetitive.html#comment-65044 Sun, 18 Nov 2007 22:28:56 +0000 http://www.johnon.com/432/google-anticompetitive.html#comment-65044 John, let's take one example that I mentioned earlier: seatac.com. If a user types in seatac.com, what are they looking for? Are they looking for a parked domain? Or are they looking for Seattle-Tacoma International Airport (SEA)? I contend that most users are looking for the airport. Yahoo returns a Digimedia parked domain at #1 for [seatac.com]. Google returns the official airport home page at #1 for [seatac.com]. Personally, I like our approach better. I agree that if a user searches for example.com, they often want example.com to be returned. But I have also seen how much most users dislike most parked pages. I think the instance above is a good example of why Google's policies are pretty reasonable, but each search engine will have different philosophies about how to handle url queries and parked domains. If you want to send me 1-2 counter examples (I think you've got my email address), I'd be open to arguments that Google could pursue different/better policies on url queries and parked domains. John, let’s take one example that I mentioned earlier: seatac.com. If a user types in seatac.com, what are they looking for? Are they looking for a parked domain? Or are they looking for Seattle-Tacoma International Airport (SEA)? I contend that most users are looking for the airport. Yahoo returns a Digimedia parked domain at #1 for [seatac.com]. Google returns the official airport home page at #1 for [seatac.com]. Personally, I like our approach better.

I agree that if a user searches for example.com, they often want example.com to be returned. But I have also seen how much most users dislike most parked pages. I think the instance above is a good example of why Google’s policies are pretty reasonable, but each search engine will have different philosophies about how to handle url queries and parked domains.

If you want to send me 1-2 counter examples (I think you’ve got my email address), I’d be open to arguments that Google could pursue different/better policies on url queries and parked domains.

]]>