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RSSGoogle Gets Personal
First, a brief recap of Google's announcement and what it means to users right now. Here are the details: Now, everyone signing up for a Google account gets Search History enabled by default. The opt-out box is positioned so that most people would likely not even notice it during the sign-in process.
Whether or not you have Search History enabled, you get personalized search turned on by default. This means that Google will subtly change your results, based on various "signals," like what you have on your personalized Google Homepage and what sites you've bookmarked as Google favorites. Of course, if you have Search History enabled, this is the main "signal" for personalized search
Finally, and probably least significantly, everyone gets his or her own Google Home Page when s/he signs up for a Google account.
The End of One Page for All
Let's leave aside the privacy issues of Search History right now. That's a topic that deserves a column by itself. It's the end of the universal search results page that I want to touch on today.
There has been significant dissent voiced about Google's move to personalized search, and it's coming primarily from one source: search engine optimizers. In opposing personalized search, they're saying it degrades the user experience. I responded by saying that it was the wrench that personalized search throws into their SEO plans that was raising their ire. But let me set aside my jaundiced view of the search world for a moment and chronicle its concerns (excluding privacy issues), as near as I can understand them:
I've come out as saying that personalized search is inevitable; the day when all of us see the same page of search results is rapidly coming to a close. To me, this just seems obvious. But still, there are those that protest. Here's one example from Michael Gray, a well know SEO Blogger: "I've never met a business owner who's said, 'Man, you know what, I wish the search engines could create anarchy by making sure no two people got the exact same results for the exact same search -- that would be the best thing since sliced bread.'"
In fact, Michael's beef seems to be a consistently recurring theme among the dissenters, that a move to personalization suddenly seems to open the door for chaos on the results page. I believe the opposite is true.
Every Search is an Island
I am an individual, with unique interests, experiences, values and goals. My intent when I search for hybrid vehicles, or New York hotels, or Smart Phones, or any of the hundreds of other things I search for monthly, will be significantly different than all the other people that launch those same searches. I want a search engine smart enough to know that. I've always said that humans are complex, far too complex for a simple search box to get it right. That's why personalized search is inevitable. If we want search to move to the next level, to get smarter, more intuitive, more relevant, we need to leave standardized search results behind.
Does this mean Google will get it right out of the box? No. It will take baby steps towards what personalization eventually needs to become (although I believe those steps will be in rapid succession, because Google can hear the competition hard on its heels). Yes, there will be many who find that in the early stages, personalization may be more frustrating than it is useful. But for search to mature, these are growing pains we'll have to endure.
I've been labeled as an early proponent of personalization. I'm not sure this is necessarily the case. To me, it's not a question of liking or disliking the recent moves by Google. To me, fighting search personalization is as pointless as refusing to accept today's weather.
RSS FEEDS
Personalization has always been fraught with unfixable logic flaws - for instance I search for me, my wife, my kids and sometimes my mother or other family members. Back in the nineties when personalization was all the rage, I would go onto the various e-commerce sites practicing personalization and search for things for my family, and then laugh at the suggestions that logically stemmed from my search - the dogs playing poker paintings or the 3 CD set of Jim Nabors Love Songs. It doesn't work very well, and I suspect it never will. Now let's get to our friend Google.
They are not in the business of organic search - they make no money when organic search works. But if everyone's results were different, then a site looking for traffic would have to buy key words to have some consistancy in their ranking. Site's with naturally high rank will be thrown off, and suddenly all that money they were paying someone else (Marketing Firm, PR Firm, SEO Firm)will find its way to Google.
Let me be succint. This is not about enhancing your experience. It is about enhancing Google's bottom line. Don't get me wrong, Google is a business and it has every right to run like a business, but please don't extoll the virtues of this direction - it will make search less accurate and more frustrating.
For the SEO crowd, keep focused on good content. If your focus is on serving the needs of the user, you do it well, than two people who would be interested in your site using the same search string will have a roughly equal chance to see it. As David said in his piece, don’t cater to the few. Keep focused on the masses.
From a user perspective, I did respond to David’s piece, and have the same input here. Even giving concessions to David’s comments, I do not see the users, en mass being greatly affected. From computers with multiple users (signing in and out is not convenient) to the sheer fact that not every has a Google account (hard to believe, I know) and not everyone who does is logged in, and (finally) not all those who are have personalized search on.
In the end, as a user, vote with your mouse and turn it off.
One wonders where in the world people like Mr.Hotchkiss are coming from. Chaos theory whch Mr. Hotchkiss apparenty sees as something unique to “dissenters� really is rather beside the point.
It merely discloses that if Mr. Hotchkiss had a scintilla of knowledge about chaos theory as applied to information per se, he would understand that there is an inverse correlation between the uniformity and complexity of any system, including information systems, and the ability of such systems to produce reliable results.
And, by results, I don’t mean smarter, more intuitive and more relevant marketing. I mean exactly the opposite, which is efficacy.
Technological utopians presumably rejoice when people people like Hotchkiss declare that “I am an individual, with unique interests, experiences, values and goals. My intent when I search for hybrid vehicles, or New York hotels, or Smart Phones, or any of the hundreds of other things I search for monthly, will be significantly different than all the other people that launch those same searches."
Aside from the fact that statistical probability precludes that his search results over time will be “significantly different than all other people that launch those same searches�, there is this unfortunate tendency from people like Mr. Hotchkiss to avoid thinking through the possible ramifications of so-called smarter, more intuitive and more relevant search, when applied to "personalization" as distinct from marketing.
If personalization in terms of aggregating, manipulating and then using without regard to the significant privacy interests that people have in their own information, is the inevitable next level beyond standardization- then all of us, including Mr. Hotchkiss, are in big trouble.
Hopefully, the actual next level will in result in a mature contemplation of what matters and what’s important to human beings in terms of their own information and privacy issues, before we turn over to mathematical algorithms what amounts in fact to impersonal and indiscreet management of our lives.
I would want to EASILY toggle between a personalized and a non-personalized search. I would probably use BOTH until I was confident the personalized search was delivering better results. If it delivered WORSE results, I'd turn it off until I heard the algorithm changed.
And speaking of algorithms, I would want to know HOW they personalize the search.
Now I am an anomalous user, being an IT veteren of 26 years and used to using SQL to query relational databases. I believe this is something Google wants to do to personalize its advertising and generate more revenue. If the personalized search degrades the search results, people will go elsewhere than Google.