- Let me turn off Personalized Search easily. Google, I'm human and humans are lazy. We don't want to be adding letters to URLs every time we want to search without personalization, and we sure as heck don't want to sign in and out of Gmail every time we search. I recommend a biggity-big-ass button next to all the "My Notebooks" / "Web History" rubbish that says "TURN OFF PERSONALIZED SEARCH." I don't care that 99% of the population won't know what that means. They don't know what Advanced Search means and you keep that link around.
- Make Image Search... better. Google Image Search is kind of weird. I search for something; you return pictures of very odd things that I did not search for. Yeah, those are pictures of guys in Speedos, an objectionable road sign and something from Lisa's blog. Let me demonstrate another odd result I recently came across: Your third results page for the term "malinois puppy". Scroll down... Yes, Google - those are pictures of me. I am not a young Belgian shepherd. I'm aware of how my pictures ended up there, but I doubt anyone looking for photos of cuddly puppies actually wanted to see pictures from my SEOmoz profile. Live doesn't appear to have this problem.
- Although I recognize that on the eighth day, God created Gmail, why is it that you insist on adding everyone I email to my Google Talk window? I email people whom I'd rather didn't see my stupid status messages, most of which are composed in fluent LOLcat. I feel bad "blocking" them, as I don't dislike these people. This worries me as much as the idea that people can add my screen name to their AOL instant messengers without me knowing.
- Still on Gmail for a moment, I must say that I find your targeted Adsense intriguing. Every new email comes with the anticipation of what ads you'll have dreamed up for me this time. Funnily enough, most of them are for SEO services. I find this very amusing.
- Let me search for a keyword and simultaneously exclude all pages that contain some other keyword. For example, if I wanted to search for "rebecca kelley" but exclude all pages that also mention "seomoz", I'd like to have a command like -term: or -keyword:. Does this currently exist? If so, please let me know about it. (EDIT FROM RAND: just use rebecca kelley -seomoz, you can even do it super cool and use intitle:rebecca intitle:kelley -inurl:seomoz if you want to go super advanced.)
- Let me personalize the links atop the SERPs. I use the Blog Search and Blogger links virtually every day, so can I add them to the regular menu of Images, Video, etc? Thanks in advance.
- Customize the logo more often. Don't do it so much that we're all, "Oh. Another customized day. What is it, Thursday?" But do it more than three times a year. It's adorable.
- I couldn't care less if you keep or remove Wikipedia entries from the SERPs. Although the WikiP is irritating, it's sometimes all you need.
What I would like you to remove is the Digg results. Did it ever occur to you that ranking the page that the Digg entry links to would be smarter? The same goes for Netscape pages. Leaving Reddit results there is fine: I cannot fault Reddit without feeling like I've done an injustice to the little alien. - Please add more one-box results, and please add more variations for how we can get them. For instance, if I search for this question one way, I get nothing useful. Not everyone will use the correct wording in order to get the calculator's answer.
- Is Orkut really necessary? I don't know how I managed to get signed up with Orkut (I imagine it was for some Web 2.0 Awards-related investigation) but now I get messages like this: "how ru? i am Anthony. i would like to be your friend,so if you like write me. no reply means u do't have courage to answer. if u accept me as your friend that will real pleasure :-)" That's a real message; I didn't make it up. Please accept defeat in the social networking circle.
By: Jane Copland
Dear Google
Search Engines
The author's views are entirely his or her own (excluding the unlikely event of hypnosis) and may not always reflect the views of Moz.
As a midyear Christmas present, I'd like to ask Google for a few things that would make my life a bit easier. Just to clarify, Google, I love you very much and I think you're superb, but everyone can do better. These are my requests:
i would like an easy way to navigate from one google product to another. i'd like to be logged into analytics and be able easily get to webmaster tools or adwords. right now i can't seem to do that without having to go back to google.com and click on my account.
oh and trying to get to analytics while signed into adwords creates a huge confusion.
Searching without personalized search is done easily thanks to Joost de Valk. Couldn't live without this one.
https://www.joostdevalk.nl/google-de-personalized-search-for-firefox-and-ie7/
Word. Joost's plugin is a godsend!
ah yes, the ever fabulous de-personalized search plug in. i wouldn't search without it. seriously, way easier than adding blah blah blah to the end of every query.
It even works in (gasp) IE 7.
Regarding the Gmail ads, look at the great stuff being offered on your spam page. I even wrote about it.
You beat me to it!
Inventively simple. Nice.
Is there something weird about needing a plug-in to disable a feature?
On the flip side google image search can be very entertaining, beyond that I agree. You really have to dig/pray to find anything useful.
Definately agree with point 8. Most of the time the digg results page really has no use (or useful comments).
Perhaps add point 11 - buy and dissolve Ask.com, or get the Reddit alien to take it back to his planet.
You're right. In a way, I hope google image search never changes. I'll never forget the time in high school I was trying to find images from the movie "the jerk" (not sure why), but you can imagine what came up and the shocking hilarity that ensued. Maybe they can preserve image search the way it is while implementing improvements, ie: a tiny button in a corner that would give you the old crappy results. Doing that would also help demonstrate the improvements.
Gave a thumbs up mostly because that movie is hysterical, but also because of your recommendation on how to improve the image search. Too often people comment on the flaw without thinking of a way to improve upon it.
I agree on Item 2
Image result are so bad that even Google cant find itself. Try searching for Google official logo Even Yahoo is better at finding Google
Wow, that's pretty funny. And pretty tragic at the same time.
#4: To be honest, I know that there are ads, but I literally never acually see them.
#6: the personalization of the links atop the SERPs would be relly great!
#8: I think I have seen digg pages coming up 2-3 times so far, not that big of a problem for me.
#9: seth godin recently noticed that google started to implement onebox results for books. try searching for "david sedaris".
#11. A couple of thousand shares wouldn't go amiss.
ad 1.) ..turn off Personalized Search ... i recommend the depersonalizer (comes with a compare function) and there are some greasmonkey scripts out there, too.
Thank you Franz--I was trying to remember how I did it so I could pass it on! :)
Amen Sister!
Especially about the gmail adding people to the chat window. Susan never has ME in her chat window, and always has all these weird people! I want to be top on her chat list!
Has anyone experimented with "-" notation? Such as "python -snake"? I'm pretty sure that does it. Try it and then go to advanced search.
Yeah. This works.
i.e. site:SEOmoz.org -lolcat would return pages on SEOmoz minus those that mention lolcat.
Lol! I was making things more difficult for myself by assuming you'd need some command to go with -, like "term" or "keyword." Way to blind us with simplicity, Google.
They are absolutely amazing at doing that, aren't they? Imagine the loads of info they must have on the human psyche with all that user data!
By the way here are some observations from someone else who uses gmail (not official in any way) about the order of contacts in gmail:
"The top 5 people I chat w/ most often appear in that window. if you want to appear in the window, IM me often. b) within those 5 people, they're shown in order of 1. active vs. idle (so don't ever go idle), and 2. alphabetic order. So change your name to Aaron, never go idle, and IM me 20 times a day and you'll always be on top"
Easy fix for #3 Gmail chat:
Go to Settings > Chat > Only allow people that I've explicitly approved to chat with me and see when I'm online
dude! Rad!
God bless you and all you stand for for writing, saying and otherwise embracing the correct usage of the phrase, "couldn't care less." Couldn't, people! Not could. Never could, unless of course it's a topic that really matters to you (i.e. one that you actually do care about).
Sorry folks, it's a peeve.
Oh, lordy - I could care less about your peeves, Scott.
:)
And I couldn't care less about your stupid head, Stupidhead! :P
nice in fighting.... be careful Scott I hear she can go off at you like a "pile of moldy towels"
Haha, good one, Aussie. Inside jokes are always fun. ;)
I know someone who is frowning right now!!!
Without wanting to get into a big debate about linguistics (oh, ok then - let's!), is the use of could instead of couldn't in the context you mention, similar to the phrase "I know from ..."?
i.e. a purposeful misuse of the word for some sort of comic effect?
Who said SEOs were boring?!
;)
The use of "could" is either sarcasm or a common misunderstanding of the meaning of the phrase, which is that I care so little, it's impossible for me to care less.
The "from" thing, as far as I know, is a Yiddishism, although in my family it was only used in the negative: "I don't know from this internet mishegas."
The one I find interesting is "a bargain at twice the price." That makes sense to me, but I've heard a number of people say "a bargain at half the price." Of course something at half price is a bargain. The expression is supposed to mean that something is so great, so desirable, that even if it cost twice as much as it does, it would still be a bargain.
All true, and well-stated. But getting all of this requires that people actually hear, parse and understand what they're saying. And we all know how decreasingly common such skills are these days... :-(
Cute post. BTW - if you want to see more of those customized logos, visit Logoogle.com.
BOTW is as good as DMOZ - better even you get someone to review you
Great post... How about in gmail the option to print only the window and not "print all"!
I should have put that one in! I was printing off an important email two nights ago and was displeased to see my Gtalk window, ads, labels etc printed off with it. When I click through to an unread message via Gtalk, it takes me to the message sans formatting - It would be great if this option was easily available at all times.
Jane
I did it too. When i get emails from people visiting my site they are lumped into from one email address (my site email). I printed out about 50 pages for 1 email before i noticed. I also cannot place the emails in different folders, because they don't separate.
and .....being able to forward an email window frame only instead of the whole file... I learned this the hard way!
By "important email" she of course means "a LOLcats image."
You can print a single email (without the surrounding interface), but they really went out of their way to hide it. In the upper-right corner of any given message, there's a "Reply" and, next to it, a down arrow. Click that down arrow and you'll see some more options, including "Print" and "Forward". Those options apply only to the current message being viewed.
Wow, they sure did go out of their way to hide that one, didn't they! Thanks for that... it will be used.
Perhaps Google will listen to you and when they do ask them to stop aligning with companies that provide mediocre services. I am referring to the Google Directory (i.e. DMOZ owned by AOL) which is really just a botched operation at this point.
I am amazed that Google has not been able to find more accurate data source, or... built a directory to compete with Yahoo!
- OldSchool
Or just dropped it altogether. I haven't lost faith in the ODP, but I don't see why Google needs to have a copy of it, or any directory at all.
BOTW is as good as DMOZ - better even you get someone to review you
DMOZ definitely has its place on the internet. I'm certain it has provided a wealth of indispensable knowledge to Google, or they wouldn't have "kept it around" as long as they have. Just because we don't see the value in it doesn't mean that value doesn't exist.
Jane your comments seem to have struck home with most of us. I know I identify with practically everything you said. Did manage to turn off personalized search though.
Jane, we respect you so much that we've launched some of your suggestions already:
1. To turn off Personalised Search, go to www.google.com/psearch (or click the 'Web History' link on your iGoogle homepage) and click the 'Pause' link. It stays paused (turned off) for as long as you like, no need for URL params.
3. In Gmail, go to Settings > Chat and select "Only allow people that I've explicitly approved to chat with me and see when I'm online." (Looks like tom6a beat me to this one.)
@florida ("How about in Gmail the option to print only the window and not 'print all'"): click the arrow in the upper righthand corner of any message and select 'Print'. You'll get a printer-friendly view of just that message (without the rest of the thread).
As for #6, I totally agree.
AdSense ads in Gmail are a bit like TiVo recommendations; it's interesting to see what a few algorithms think about your personality. I am, apparently, a raving soccer and cricket fan. Of course, you can tell just by the fact that I call it "soccer", that I'm not a raving fan.
According to teh Googlz, I am into:
Ah, one of those is not quite accurate. I searched through my email, and I could not work out for the life of me why it was advertising milk formula and pacifiers.
You should sign up for MahaloMail instead. It will give you the exact same list of interests, minus SEO.
Dude, you have to be kidding. You're kidding, right? Right?
Besides which, those are some lovely ads they have on their Under Construction homepages.
Just because I'm kidding doesn't mean it won't come true.
Google is doing the predictive ad presenting - so you may have to miss SES NYC next year as you should not fly in your third trimester
Start buying them now.... you can never have enough formula and pacifiers
I loved your comment about Gmail and Adsense. I've had some very interesting ads come up that somehow relate to the email content. It's become a game now!
The image thing is funny. Could be worse than puppies though.
Wow, great post!
The Digg thing: Right on... how DUMB is that??
Vic
Nice wish list. I agree with all your comments, some more than others.
I've actually gotten messages from people I've sent email to through gmail telling me they "love my inane status messages" and that I "make them laugh" - when I'm eating a spicy lunch, and I change my status message to "if it burns going down, it's going to burn coming out", people I don't know don't need to see this....especially because some of them might be clients (or potential clients).
And on the Orkut front - I'm sure they keep it around just to dabble in the space, but c'mon guys! Buy FaceBook and be done with it already! You know you want to!
Regarding 1) : May have been mentioned (seen plugins mentioned but not just a JS link), but if not, just drag this : No PWS to your bookmark toolbar. (edit - may just be me, but that isn't working. The "url" should be javascript:location.href=location.href+'&pws=0' )
I would love them to give you the option to remove personalised search aswell
Agree with everything in the list, although I doubt they will close orkut
Here in Brazil Orkut is really necessary. More then food O.O
I'm sorry....I absolutely could-not-help-myself.
Completely agree with Guilherme. Shutting down Orkut means shutting down the most accessed website in Brazil at the moment (with huge potential to grow: we are, after all, +185 million people). In the point of view of Brazilians, Facebook and MySpace are almost non-existant. Why? They're hard to customize, slow to access at the most common connection speeds (dial-up and 300kbps ADSL/Cable), untranslated, etc.
If I had to guess, I'd say Orkut is a success in Brazil because it made creating forums easy through Communities, which also serve a double-duty of being "personal tags". The first thing we do when we find a new contact is to see the list of Communities they're in; it's like looking at del.icio.us tags, except you're finding people.
I'd like to search the feeds in my Google Reader. Without creating my own custom search for it or adding a script.
I am 99% sure that the "-" does exist and works. I have been using it for ages under the assumption that it was a valid command...i hope it was and is a valid command ;)
"Let me turn off Personalized Search easily."
Ding ding ding! Winnah!
I would have to agree 100%... What a pain in the ass it is! Your other points make sense too. Nice work...
Your third results page for the term "malinois puppy". Scroll down... Yes, Google - those are pictures of me.
i started to say.. how the holy he!! did u find that.. then i looked at my stats... i won't mention what my pics came up for..
good article :)
I found those pictures when I was searching for pictures of cuddly puppies :) Definitely did not expect to find photos of myself!
Okay you are cute and cuddly.... but stop interuoting my stalking of Rebecca
Hey Jane,
"Please accept defeat in the social networking circle."
Actually Orkut is the one of the most popular social networking sites as for total number of active users. When you consider the latin american emerging market (Brazil, Chile, Mexico, Peru, Columbia, etc..) They're doing quite well in fact.
Love your articles btw, and you're still at least the second hottest female SEO professional.
- DannyZ
Someone already mentioned Orkut's popularity in South America, so that is duly noted.
It is bad form to mention a female's looks when commenting on her professional ability, whether it be in a positive or negative sense. Please refrain from doing it in the future.
My deepest apologies Jane. Wasn't trying to offend.
There's some pretty good articles about Orkut out there. Also, just got around to reading all of the followups for 2007 SES Latino, so Latin American market is still fresh on my mind. With the potential in the Spanish/Portuguese market, this is something very exciting to someone like me who speaks spanish and has a passion for Internet Marketing in general.
Not trying to be a cheerleader for Orkut, and I feel your pain on the messages from random people, as I've received similar messages from Anthony, Antonio, Brassius, and Peter.
Again, sorry for the off the cuff comment. I'll refrain from those sort and any future attempts at humor.
Is okay to say your seo skills are as hot as you look!!!
Second hottest?! Dude, talk about a backhanded compliment...
Jennifer you are number one to me...
your faithful stalker
.....you're #1
Apologies in advance.