Google in the Bizarro World

[djbaxter]

For the oldtimers among us, this story from Search Engine Roundtable is pretty funny.



My SEO & Google World Is Upside Down
by Barry Schwartz, Search Engine Roundtable
November 22, 2017

Google had a bug where they showed recent searches pop up automatically on the Google home page under the search box. It was a bug, Google fixed it, but that is not the problem with my Google world.

One of the first people to notice and complain about it publicly was Matt Cutts. Yes, the Matt Cutts who was one of Google's first 100 employees, spam defender, porn cookie man, defender of all things negative about Google. He complained on Google+ calling this "super annoying."

He wrote:

Just passing on the feedback that showing recent searches when you show up on the Google home page before you've even typed anything is super annoying. My Dad already asked how to turn it off, and he normally doesn't care about any UX/UI stuff. How do you actually turn it off?

​

Then Danny Sullivan, who is now working at Google, comes on Twitter to tell me that it was his response sent through the PR person at Google.

<iframe id="twitter-widget-0" scrolling="no" allowtransparency="true" allowfullscreen="true" class="twitter-tweet twitter-tweet-rendered" style="position: absolute; visibility: hidden; display: block; width: 0px; height: 0px; padding: 0px; border: medium none;" frameborder="0"></iframe>

And now @rustybrick’s head explodes when I answer a question @mattcutts raises about Google search https://t.co/8RddkOkVWv
— Danny Sullivan (@dannysullivan) November 21, 2017​

<script async="" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Then Matt Cutts chimes in that he may start writing for Search Engine Land, as a joke:

<iframe id="twitter-widget-1" scrolling="no" allowtransparency="true" allowfullscreen="true" class="twitter-tweet twitter-tweet-rendered" style="position: absolute; visibility: hidden; display: block; width: 0px; height: 0px; padding: 0px; border: medium none;" frameborder="0"></iframe>

it's all fun and games until I have to start writing columns for Search Engine Land.
— Matt Cutts (@mattcutts) November 22, 2017​

<script async="" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Read more...