A feeling of dread
Frank Wojcik
I just hopped on over to Google, and well, something is different. Is
Google asking its users to spam their friends? Oh dear. And the URL in
their proposed message is 404 compliant right now. Plus, they are
hawking an affiliate program. "OK, terrific!"
So, am I being too cynical, or is there a whiff of vermin in the air?
Has this always been there, and I've just been too dense to notice?
Any monks with some relevant clue to share?
--
Life is complicated, but winter narrows it down to a few simple problems: heat,
food, shelter, plumbing. And it focuses you in wonderful ways. You don't have
to search for your personal identity in winter; winter gives it to you. You are
prey in winter; nature is making a serious attempt to kill you. - GK/PHC
Paul Tomblin
>I just hopped on over to Google, and well, something is different. Is
>Google asking its users to spam their friends? Oh dear. And the URL in
Oh. My. God.
Is there any search engine left that isn't evil?
--
Paul Tomblin <ptom...@xcski.com>, not speaking for anybody
"AOL would be a giant diesel-smoking bus with hundreds of ebola victims on
board throwing dead wombats and rotten cabbage at the other cars"
- a.s.r throws the Information Superhighway metaphor into reverse.
Tanuki the Raccoon-dog
said
>In a previous article, Frank Wojcik <fwo...@shell.monmouth.com> said:
>>I just hopped on over to Google, and well, something is different. Is
>>Google asking its users to spam their friends? Oh dear. And the URL in
>
>Oh. My. God.
>
>Is there any search engine left that isn't evil?
I find catting the contents of a _large_ web-cache into
grep to be interesting. No annoying banner ads, but it
does kinda depend on you having the same taste in pr0n as
your lusers...
--
!Raised Tails! -:Tanuki:-
http://www.canismajor.demon.co.uk/index.html
"The crackle of folding money is persuasive"
Eric The Read
> In a previous article, Frank Wojcik <fwo...@shell.monmouth.com> said:
> >I just hopped on over to Google, and well, something is different. Is
> >Google asking its users to spam their friends? Oh dear. And the URL in
>
> Oh. My. God.
>
> Is there any search engine left that isn't evil?
Nope. The last hope was Savvysearch, and it now has delusions of
portalhood too. It's all over now, nothing to do but wait for the
Vogons.
-=Eric
--
"Cutting the space budget really restores my faith in humanity. It
eliminates dreams, goals, and ideals and lets us get straight to the
business of hate, debauchery, and self-annihilation."
-- Johnny Hart
Alan J. Wylie
> Oh. My. God.
> Is there any search engine left that isn't evil?
<UI>
http://www.topclick.com/
No Cookies | No Banner Ads | No Personal Data Disclosed
</UI>
_Does_ have an affiliates program, though.
Gives identical results to google, by some strange coincidence.
--
Alan J. Wylie http://www.glaramara.freeserve.co.uk
Build a system that even an idiot can use,
and only an idiot will want to use it
Mike Sphar
the following? Read the book:
>In a previous article, Frank Wojcik <fwo...@shell.monmouth.com> said:
>>I just hopped on over to Google, and well, something is different. Is
>>Google asking its users to spam their friends? Oh dear. And the URL in
>
>
>Is there any search engine left that isn't evil?
Hmm...the Google offices are right next door to my office. Maybe I should
walk over and offer some enlightenment.[1]
It's nice, at least, that they claim to not be collecting the email
addresses, but still...bad search engine! Bad!
[1] No, not the GUI, though it certainly is purty.
--
Mike Sphar http://mikey.sanjoseweb.com mi...@matches.com
...most SF writers are small blokes; they spent a lot of time grubbing
around on the floor for old SF mags, not stretching up to the top shelf for
pornography...As an aside, Douglas Adams is quite tall -- Terry Pratchett
Eddie Buckley
> Gives identical results to google, by some strange coincidence.
It uses the google servers to do the actual search.
Eddie
Lionel Lauer
>In a previous article, Frank Wojcik <fwo...@shell.monmouth.com> said:
>>I just hopped on over to Google, and well, something is different. Is
>>Google asking its users to spam their friends? Oh dear. And the URL in
>
>Oh. My. God.
>
>Is there any search engine left that isn't evil?
Their April Fool gag is kind of cute though.
--
W
. | ,. w , "Some people are alive only because
\|/ \|/ it is illegal to kill them." Perna condita delenda est
---^----^---------------------------------------------------------------
D. Joseph Creighton
}Their April Fool gag is kind of cute though.
Do share.
--
"Ever stop to think, and forget to start again?" - Anon.
D. Joseph Creighton [ESTP] | Programmer Analyst, Database Technologies, IST
Joe_Cr...@UManitoba.CA | University of Manitoba Winnipeg, MB, Canada, eh?
David Scheidt
: In the last exciting episode, Lionel Lauer <long...@newsguy.com> wrote:
: }Their April Fool gag is kind of cute though.
: Do share.
Mind reading search engine. Think about your search, click the spinny
thing, it searches on "April Fools". If they had done p0rn, how many people
would have thought it worked?
--
dsch...@enteract.com
Ketchup, therefore, shows both thixotropic and pseudoplastic rheological
properties. -- John Schmitt, in AFU
Lionel Lauer
that:
>In the last exciting episode, Lionel Lauer <long...@newsguy.com> wrote:
>}Their April Fool gag is kind of cute though.
>
>Do share.
You've only just seen this post, eh?
Hm, they have not only restored it to normal, but seem to have removed
all reference to it on their site & from their engine.
Well, they did a couple of things:
A radical new search engine technology called a 'mentalplexer', which
purported to read your mind to work out what you were searching for. It
was complete with bogus instructions, error messages, etc.
A results page with all the text in German instead of English.
Simo Tuominen
>D. Joseph Creighton <d...@cc.umanitoba.ca> wrote:
>> In the last exciting episode, Lionel Lauer <long...@newsguy.com> wrote:
>> }Their April Fool gag is kind of cute though.
>>
>> Do share.
>
>Found this at www.arstechnica.com:
>
>The guys at Google have unveiled the latest and greatest in search engine
>technology: MentalPlex. What is MentalPlex? From the FAQ:
They thought Googleplex would be too obvious?
>Unlike regular search engines that require you to type a query to conduct
>a search, MentalPlex search anticipates your request by evaluating over
>1.3 billion variables including:
>
> the last 5 sites you visited before coming to Google
> current air pressure, humidity and ozone content
> astrological configuration at the time of your visit
> speed and vectors of your mouse movement
> personal aura and brainwave activity
So the search result should be almost, but not completely, unlike tea.
>Using proprietary predictive search algorithms developed through 13 years
>of research by an international consortium of PhDs in the fields of
>artificial and pseudo-intelligence, parapsychology and improbability,
Oh yes, I think that someone's had an overdose of DNA.