
Google starts showing full page previews in search results - bjonathan
http://www.blogstorm.co.uk/google-starts-showing-full-page-previews-in-search-results/
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rarestblog
This is very bad.

People won't have to visit the page they found - meaning no visit, no ads
shown, no money. Every real content producer is going to lose BIG with this.

Also this looks like World-Wide Copyright Infringement to me. Possibly, a good
reason for class action suit from everyone who created any kind of site.
Google now creates and distributes large portions of your web page without any
kind permission. (I don't think this (near full-size screenshots with readable
text) could pass as "fair use" in any kind of sane trial)

Sadly, this is exactly what I predicted 2 years ago: "What worries me is the
amount of text they [Cuil] show on the search page. It's becoming much and
much more of a nuisance that search companies think it's okay to massively
copy parts of your site and display them. "

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jeromec
No, you're thinking small. First, the full page shows including ads. If
anything potentially _more_ sites and ads will receive a view as users mouse
over results. The difference is a user doesn't have to go to a page and be
annoyed with pop-up messages before hitting the back button. When a site with
the desired content is found the user will then click through to it.

This appears to me to offer end users a better search/browse experience, and
that's always a win for everybody.

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rarestblog
You can't tell your advertiser: "Hey, your ads, probably, were shown about a
hundred thousand times on Google. Well, I can't prove it, users can't click on
it and also they see a random frame from your ads (if they see it at all), but
still now you can pay me".

Why would I (as a visitor) need to click the site if I see what I searched for
right there, on Google screenshot?

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jeromec
_Why would I (as a visitor) need to click the site if I see what I searched
for right there, on Google screenshot?_

Because that's not how people typically interact with websites. If it was, the
World Wide Web would simply be made of small JPEG pic versions of what sites
look like. If you have a site with quality content on it, which happens to be
ranked high in search results I can pretty much guarantee you are still going
to receive your high click-through traffic. You may even receive more. The
only people who lose out with this are those with low quality or spam type
sites where their traffic is "crap, not what I wanted" hit-the-back-button
clicks, which don't provide much value to advertisers anyway.

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rarestblog
Imagine this: you search for some topic. You hover over one result and get a
pretty big chunk of text about that topic, you hover over the next one - you
get one more big chunk of text, you hover over 2-4 more - you've all the
information you need. There's no more need to click.

I don't mind "small JPEG pic versions of what sites look like" - these are
fine. I'm strongly against the JPGs of site where you can read text from my
site. And with a move of mouse - from next site. All cropped around the
subject without any ads or any message attached to article that PAID for this
article.

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jeromec
I'm sorry, but I still think you are thinking small. Let's assume the type of
site or query is not shopping or research related where a user must scroll,
click, etc. for the site, and it's news type editorial. You're thinking users
will prefer to squint and experience the page/article with the preview version
instead of simply clicking through to the site? What about comments? Hacker
News is a great example of just how much value comments add to content. I
think you're guarding user behavior that doesn't need to be guarded. The only
sites that have anything to fear from this are ones users don't want to be on.
If users want to be on your site, they will be.

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rarestblog
Don't you USUALLY read editorial type news on the site you know, instead of
SEARCHING for it?

Do you seriously think that "research and shopping" doesn't constitute
overwhelming majority of searches?

Do you seriously assume that searching for editorial content is what majority
of users do instead of "research and shopping"?

The only thing I'm guarding is MY OWN CONTENT. I wrote it. I own it. I don't
want Google to display it in readable form in bigger and bigger chunks every
year. I'd opt out of "short snippets" they show now if it was possible - leave
the titles - that'd be ENOUGH to reference my content.

Google was built on shoulders of people who produce the content. Now Big G.
acts like they own this content and are free to do whatever they please with
it to satisfy visitors on THEIR site and earn money from THEIR ads, using MY
content.

I do understand it's better experience for visitors, but why would I want to
produce the content anymore if Google steals my profit by showing the content
directly to users? I want people who benefit from my content to be on MY site,
not on Google site.

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jeromec
_Don't you USUALLY read editorial type news on the site you know, instead of
SEARCHING for it?_

Yes, probably.

 _Do you seriously think that "research and shopping" doesn't constitute
overwhelming majority of searches?_

Yes, I do think so and that supports my point. Those type searches are not
usually satisfied by viewing a small screenshot of a site's homepage.

 _The only thing I'm guarding is MY OWN CONTENT. I wrote it. I own it._

Calm down. I certainly agree content creators own the rights to their content.
:)

If this is really a problem I'm sure Google would allow some way for sites to
opt out of the preview. However, I'm thinking that Google's priority is to
give users the best search experience possible, so sites that don't allow the
preview might rank lower in search results. I'd certainly allow it for my
sites.

 _Google was built on shoulders of people who produce the content._

I'd argue there is a symbiotic relationship between content creators and
search engines/portals. Without each other neither would likely have many
visitors.

I totally agree content creators have the right to say how their content is
displayed beyond fair use. However, at the same time Google and other search
engines are going to strive to give users the best possible experience, and
that probably means helping them avoid spammy/low quality sites by previewing
past them.

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rarestblog
I'm glad we agree.

Yes, it was symbiotic, that's why it was "kind of" fair play until NOW.

Now they're pulling the blanket to their side and it starts to get parasitic.

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neovive
I could see definitely see arguments on both sides of the fence regarding this
feature. It may also lead to more work for designers, since the "first
impression" of a website would occur before the click-through.

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notahacker
I can see the usability benefits, not least when it tells the user the obscure
phrase they searched for is found in the third article down the page.

Unless the website is designed to be readable as a scaled down .jpeg and/or
the entire useful content of a page is encapsulated in the single paragraph
Google chooses to highlight I don't think it's a massive loss for webmasters.
If sites have to look halfway decent to get decent click throughs it could be
a godsend for designers though.

The implementation is pretty ugly...

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arb99
Should be able to disable it in robots.txt or meta tags, so shouldn't be a big
deal for publishers.

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brownleej
That's true, but that doesn't make it OK. Google is making copies of other
people's work without permission, and displaying them for profit. That is the
kind of thing that copyright law was meant to prevent. This should be an opt-
in feature, something that publishers can _enable_ in robots.txt, if they
think it will help them get more traffic.

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Pewpewarrows
People have been using extensions to add website thumbnails to search results
for years without a peep from web developers screaming copyright infringement.

Why don't I see you complaining about them providing textual context to the
term searched for? Oh, right, because every other search engine on the planet
does it. So now that Google is adding by default something that extensions
have had for a while now, a graphical context in addition to text, you
suddenly think it's evil?

Give me a break.

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brownleej
The amount being copied makes a big difference, in terms of fair use. If
you're copying the entire page, and _showing_ it to people, then that's a more
egregious violation than taking a small snippet to provide context.

I'd also say that Google's caching is a copyright violation, and should be
opt-in. Google seems to have this notion that because they're above the law
when it comes to copyright. They're not. They may be doing this for good
reasons, and it may have positive effects for the users of their search
engine, but that's irrelevant. The law is the law.

Also, I never said that it was evil. I only said that they shouldn't do it.
There is a wide gap between those two assertions.

*Edited to change "provide text" to "provide context" at the end of the first paragraph, and remove an unfortunate use of all caps. Wasn't thinking as clearly as I should have been, sorry.

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Pewpewarrows
<http://www.blogstorm.co.uk/images/google-new-previews.png>

It's a large thumbnail where the text isn't legible at all outside of a few
select words and the extracted surrounding text. This isn't the same as
providing a full-page preview with Google wrapping it in an iframe, for
example, to get advertising revenue. People still have to go to your site to
read anything outside of the contextual text.

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aresant
This experiment illustrates the potential for Google.com to evolve into a
cloud-based Chrome.

They can own the browsing experience regardless of the browser or platform
used.

Think about the potential this has as browsing from televisions, set-top
boxes, mobile etc continues to explode.

