It is so ironic that SEO has become the very problem it was invented to fix: all these jokers gaming the system have all but plunged us all back into prehistoric internet times, before search engines appeared and people had to remember which specific sites to go to find information online.
this post was submitted on 27 Aug 2023
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SEO solved the problem it was meant to fix, i.e. "users arent looking at our site enough." You're fooling yourself if you think it was ever about making searches more useful for the user.
The very conceit of SEO defeats the purpose of a search. The idea is the search combs through sites, finds what the user wants, and returns it to them based on what it believes is the closest match to what the user wanted. It's a process between two parties: the user and the search engine. The second the websites start trying to inject themselves into this process by adjusting their content to the search, it corrupts the process.
Picture yourself in a library looking through the card catalog. You're searching for something, using a system to locate it. Imagine if the books you're looking for spontaneously changed their titles or authorship just to "help you find them" while you're flipping through cards. Imagine if you're walking down the shelves and books are literally shifting around like fucking Hogwarts, trying to get in front of you.
That is the inherent issue with SEO. No one but the user knows what the user wants to see, the content trying to adjust itself to appear in the results more consistently isn't about helping the user find what they want, it's about making sure the user sees that specific content.
Because every website wants traffic. That's all it is.
Stick to sites you know. If you're looking for a review and you get a hit on a site you don't know there's a better than 50% chance it's just an ad generated site (and frequently these days just the output from chatgpt).
Sucks for lesser known sites that are trying to get noticed, but unless google work out a way of removing the crap from feeds that's the way it is.
Same with youtube.. unless you trust the reviewer, assume it's paid unless there's good evidence otherwise.
Search for reddit/lemmy mentions specifically.. although those can be astroturfed too.. but the comments are generally helpful.
people are gave some good answers.
it boils down to various large sites.
wikipedia(app) and reddit(app) are my top.
often time i just bang out a search and pinpoint the answer and trash the rest.
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stackexchanges and ycomb are some other popular sites.
quora used to seem attractive but information is questionable and the whole experience is trash.
gemini,bookmarks,chatgpt are some others. also libgen .
Quora (https://www.quora.com) is marketed as "A place to share knowledge and better understand the world".. You can ask questions and get them answered by experts, or you can find questions already answered by experts..
I follow some reviewers on YouTube, Project Farm is a great one.
I’ve switched over to a paid search engine, kagi.com. There are no ads and the results are better than DDG.
Paying for a search engine is one of the dumbest things I've ever heard lol. DDG is just better and I question what you use to guage better results, especially since you already spent money and are already susceptible to bias.
If you’re not paying for it, you are the product. Don’t knock it til you try it.
That's a very black and white view of the world and is not true.
What, to try things before you dismiss them as dumb?
I have a super secret search engine that reads your mind for only $20/mo. You wanna try?
Sure, if there’s a free trial (Kagi has one). Though if it’s from you, probably not 😉
Lemmings are going to crucify me for this, but here goes anyway...
site:www.reddit.com
Honestly, niche YouTube channels. The problem is sometimes you don't want to sit through a 30-45 minute video to find the information you're after.
I haven't found Google useful as a search engine for years and now Youtube is squeezing creators and pushing so many ads it will become unusable for me once the anti-ad-blocker policy is fully implemented. Paying for Youtube premium isn't the answer either, it will cost as much as Amazon Prime just to watch YT videos, then the price will continue to rise after we subscribe to the service.
We must remember that Alphabet Inc, the parent company of these services is an essentially an advertising company that also sells the data they collect about us to virtually anyone, including police in right-wing states looking to arrest abortion seekers.
https://telegra.ph/How-Big-Tech-Revenue-and-Profit-Breaks-Down-by-Company-12-09
https://www.androidauthority.com/youtube-anti-adblocking-feature-3354930/
Worth noting my youtube premium subscription price hasn't changed since I signed up in 2017.
If I cancel this deal I have and go to sign up again, or change to a family plan then the price goes up.
I'm not sure if this is the norm, or a special part of the deal I got but just a bit of extra info
I use Kagi and it's just amazing. Don't have any problems. You can also configure Kagi to prioritize certain sites and remove others you don't care about. Very happy with it.
The bullshit is because Google wants you to visit shitty sites because of ad revenues.
Throw them out of your life.
I've tried it for a couple of days, but didn't work for me. I've switched to ddg and loving it so far. Much better results than Google. Even Bing works better at work where Edge is the default browser.
I was on ddg for a while too, but found myself switching to Google sometimes with the !g syntax.