

How Google Got its New Look  - profgubler
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/10_20/b4178000295757.htm

======
ck2
I don't like the new look.

<http://i.imgur.com/Uw2ry.png>

If I wanted it to look like Bing, I'd use Bing.

~~~
garply
It does look a lot like Bing - but they copied the intelligent suggestions
part of Bing, which is what I like about it (for example, the images filter
will stand out when Google thinks I might be looking for images). I kind of
wish they would give me suggested queries on the left like Bing does too.

Ever since I had my Google service disrupted by the Great Chinese Firewall
(text queries are fine now, but innocent Google image queries have always been
dicey whereas Bing image searches are almost never blocked), I've been using
Bing as my default. I'm pretty satisfied with the results for the text result
queries. And when you compare the two image search engines (at least
interface-wise), I think Bing wins hands down.

~~~
ubernostrum
Except they didn't really copy Bing; this results layout has, unless I'm
mistaken, been kicking around for a while, with tricks for turning it on so
you'd always get it.

~~~
judofyr
It's also just a sidebar. Not really a revolutionary idea.

------
karzeem
Single page link:
[http://www.businessweek.com/print/magazine/content/10_20/b41...](http://www.businessweek.com/print/magazine/content/10_20/b4178000295757.htm)

------
timcederman
_Most of those details are hashed out at a daily "stand-up" meeting of roughly
10 people, held at 4:07 p.m. (Google co-founder Sergey Brin once estimated
that it took seven minutes to walk across the Google campus; it's now company
tradition that meetings end on the hour and new ones start seven minutes
later.)_

Um, what? This isn't something I've heard of.

~~~
enomar
I've heard that on multiple occasions from Googlers.

~~~
timcederman
While I don't work at Google, I have dozens of Googler friends and none have
ever mentioned this.

I spoke to a couple today, in addition to asking my wife. All said they'd
never heard of it.

------
bemmu
The article says that Google doesn't disclose which part of revenues comes
from AdWords and which from AdSense. But what about this slide from their
quarterly earnings report <http://i.imgur.com/v0ijp.png> I always assumed that
"google.com" refers to AdWords and "network" refers to AdSense.

------
nopassrecover
On a side note, what is the origins of the tradition in business magazines to
enclose the stock ticker symbol after a listed company's name? (Inc. magazine
is another one where I notice this quite strongly)

~~~
GFischer
Do people impulse-buy stocks? (I wouldn't wonder.. maybe they think reading a
magazine article counts as "research"?)

------
guelo
I wonder why Google won't give us features such as "Mark this as spam" or "I
never want to see this again in my results".

------
robryan
On the scale of Google I wonder if that little bit of added complexity lower
overall click through on the ads. Wonder why they don't also stretch the
search out across the page like their top bar is, when you have 1920 pixels
across it seems cramped.

~~~
timcederman
Yeah, but have you seen the percentage of users with > 1280 pixels? Certainly
not the majority.

~~~
robryan
Certainly not, sure not all layouts can easily scale, but I think Google could
afford to maintain a few different widths.

I realise from my own web design and development experience that this is
easier said than done but on their scale and the problems that they deal with
I don't think it's to unreasonable.

~~~
profgubler
The reason they made it fixed width is to bring the ads closer to the results.
It was a financial move on their part.

------
eleanor
Good insider perspective on the process - for better or for worse. I'm sure
we'll get used to the new layout, I can already see how his will save me from
moving my mouse around too much.

Now only if we could get IMDb.com redesigned!

------
GeneralMaximus
I don't see the new page. Is it US-only for now?

~~~
devinj
It applies to me, and I'm in Canada.

------
mogston
The search UI improvements are particularly good now that i'm used to the
collapsible sidebar.

------
yanw
Danny Sullivan's new design in-depth: <http://searchengineland.com/meet-the-
new-google-41286>

