Failure as Defined by Google
When search engines stack results based on their own secret criteria, sometimes I get nervous. Sure, some people might find Google’s results for failure amusing, but I can’t help wondering where else they might be tinkering with results to express a certain message or move other links higher. When else might they be joking when someone could think they’re serious? It’s a trust issue, I suppose.
Addendum 9/17: I’ve heard from a few people about Google bombing in light of this post. It makes perfect sense that people (not necessarily people employed by Google or any other search engine company) can alter the order of items in search results based on any number of criteria. They have been doing that for years. When someone told me about the failure results–a person who often finds humorous results in Google and shares them with me–I didn’t think about how other people could be influencing the search results. I don’t know why I didn’t–probably because I was too busy looking for myself on that list–nor do I know why I didn’t think to check other search engines to see what they do for failure. It was sloppy reporting on my part. My apologies.
September 16th, 2005 at 2:19 am
Google results hacking can be easily (quote-unquote) done without involving google. You just need enough links of the form magicword
September 16th, 2005 at 4:36 pm
Hi, I enjoy your blog.
Just wanted to quickly let you know that this is an example (and probably the most famous example) of a Google bombing, not a political comment by the creators of Google.