New MSN Search Becoming My Search Engine Of Choice

Google is no longer the search engine it once was. It no longer returns the search results that led people (including myself) to proclaim that it was the best search engine on the planet.

Lately, I often do not find what I am searching for on Google so I check the new MSN Search and guess what? The information I am looking for is there - right in the top few results! This is becoming a habit for me and I suspect it will for a lot more people too as I hear rumblings from friends that "Google isn't very good anymore".

Give MSN Search a try - I think you may actually like it.

Allegra Observations

Google's Allegra Update is still going on - this is the longest update in recent memory. Aside from the disappearance of vast swathes of websites, this update also includes an algorithm change which is not index wide but seems to be placed on specific keywords just the way the Florida Update was in 2003.

Google's results are still changing frequently and when it will all settle down is anyone's guess. With the Florida Update they applied their algorithm change to sets of keywords and then added more to the list in the following days and weeks. I suspect that is what is happening with Allegra as well.

There has been some speculation that the major changes in Google that are being seen with this current update are due to Google beginning to use Latent Semantic Indexing - which is basically a method used by search engines to learn to associate certain terms with concepts. Whatever you call it, something along those lines is taking place.

Here is an example... It used to be (forever and ever) that if you searched for "anycity relocations" the results would show mostly real estate sites. Now for many of the larger cities it will show mostly moving sites - Google now associates relocations with moving and not with buying real estate. Some smaller cities still show real estate sites but I suspect that will change just like what happened in the Florida Update.

There is more about LSI in this thread.

Supposedly when LSI is applied to a set of keywords the results will show sites that talk about the keyword and not sites about the keyword itself. So, what is happening now for example, is that for searches for a company name no longer shows the actual company website. Instead the first several pages of results will show sites that mention the company in passing. I find it hard to believe that any searchers find such results to be of benefit.

All of this is wonderful for Google as it drives more business to advertise using Google's Adwords product rather than relying on their search engine results as is evidenced by their recent record increase in profits.

It seems to me that the focus is no longer on creating the best search engine but in crafting a search engine where the results are just good enough to satisfy searchers and just bad enough to force business to pay Google for Adwords. It is a fine line for sure but I think it will only work in the short term. When a business takes the focus off making things better for their customers and puts it on making things better for themselves it leaves the door wide open for competitors.

Someone else can become the search engine of choice so fast it will make your head spin - just like Google did when Altavista's search results deteriorated and users fled to Google.

Google's search results now bear little resemblance to the search results that people used to consider "the best on the planet" and caused people to flock to them in droves. Changing results that the majority considered great to the results we now see can't be a good thing (when you are at the top there is only one way to go so how can making such drastic changes be helpful?). The word "GoogleVista" keeps flashing through my mind for some reason!

Google In Uncharted Territory With The "Allegra Update"

As I am writing this Google is in the middle of scrambling their index once again - some have called it an "update" although I would not agree that anything at all has been actually updated. You need to see an improvement in search results in order to call it an update in my view.

The folks over at Webmaster World began giving Google updates a name a few years ago and called this one "Allegra". This is the first "update" in about a year to receive that honor if my memory serves me correctly.

This change in Google is receiving nearly as much attention in various search engine forums as the Florida Update did in 2003 - and that says a lot! Alas, the attention is not good however. Some webmasters are lining up and threatening to quit the business much the same way as stockbrokers leaped out of windows in the Great Depression!

Other webmasters are sorry they ever promoted the virtues of Google Search to their friends, family, and customers - and are thankful that there is a new player on the block - MSN Search - to help generate traffic for their customers.

Some are describing Google's search results as a "Total System Failure" while a few other webmasters are happy because their website is finally showing up in the search results after months of absence. Those that are happy are the minority however.

The biggest complaints are the total loss of sites and sites that are in the index but do not show up for any searches - even the company name - while other unrelated sites show up instead for their company name.

What I can say is that Google has never been so unpredictable. After they made their big change with the Florida Update back in '03 they settled down and were quite predictable until the update that began December 15, 2004. Because Google had been so predictable in the past most Google watchers considered it a hiccup that would be fixed next update. Especially since there were identifiable problems such as a broken "cache:" command, so many missing sites, and an absence of spider activity.

That brings us to the current Allegra update and so far it does not look like things are going to be fixed - it looks like a continuation with even more sites gone from the index for no reason at all. Right now Google has at least two distinct indexes in their data centers that have not yet been merged so once that happens the index that you are seeing will change again. Neither of those indexes seem to be complete however so I am not holding out much hope for an improvement unless they start adding back in sites they dropped and new sites they have been ignoring.

For now, I guess all we can do is sit and watch.