I don't think I agree with that article - SEO by sites really doesn't work any more, most of the tricks that used to work have been rendered useless by Google's continuing algorithm changes. People continue to sell SEO to naive web designers though.
What skews results is deliberate filtering by the search engines themselves - directing traffic where they want it to go. So, the only non gooogle SEO that works is persuading google to do it, that takes a lot of cash spend on advertising.
It's also skewed by the "learning" processes used. These used to be tuned but I don't think they are any more, so garbage in tends to self prioritise if clicked on a lot...
Try using anonymised searches: log out of accounts, block your IP with an anonymous VPN, use startpage or other benign search front end...
A lot of people also do not use google - none of the youngsters (meaning, non tech staff under 25) in our office have a clue how to use it, and get most of their search info via facepalm, blogs, and similar social nets.
Google has also become too big for it's own good. Maps is becoming increasingly useless, there are many errors on the map even in my small part of the world; used to be if you reported errors they got fixed but now they just ignore error reports.
What skews results is deliberate filtering by the search engines themselves - directing traffic where they want it to go. So, the only non gooogle SEO that works is persuading google to do it, that takes a lot of cash spend on advertising.
It's also skewed by the "learning" processes used. These used to be tuned but I don't think they are any more, so garbage in tends to self prioritise if clicked on a lot...
Try using anonymised searches: log out of accounts, block your IP with an anonymous VPN, use startpage or other benign search front end...
A lot of people also do not use google - none of the youngsters (meaning, non tech staff under 25) in our office have a clue how to use it, and get most of their search info via facepalm, blogs, and similar social nets.
Google has also become too big for it's own good. Maps is becoming increasingly useless, there are many errors on the map even in my small part of the world; used to be if you reported errors they got fixed but now they just ignore error reports.
Does all of this really matter? I think the real point here about simple questions is not the fact that they are being asked, but the fact that they often come as a one liner, without any context or any indication that anyone has put any effort in finding a solution. If google is the best tool or not does not matter. At least you want to know what the guy/girl asking the question already tried to find an answer, and often more important: why do you want to know.. Very much often I see long winded answers to these questions, and after a few posts it turns out a completely different question needs to be answered.
So yes, you want to know why the question is asked, what answers were already found and why they were not satisfactory (enough). That gives you some context, makes you better understand the actual question, gives an indication of the knowledge level and shows that someone is serious enough to put some effort in finding an answer.
So yes, you want to know why the question is asked, what answers were already found and why they were not satisfactory (enough). That gives you some context, makes you better understand the actual question, gives an indication of the knowledge level and shows that someone is serious enough to put some effort in finding an answer.
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I also used Metacrawler a lot in the 90's.
... Thought this was a "noobs unite!" forum, like Noobs uniting to form a decentralized mass of subjectively based and heavily opinionated information/kindofthing. And now there's people claiming there are experts about? I dunno about this, my mum would probably start rattling on about illuminati by now, saying something about the NSA increasing field strength on wireless transmitters to fry the brains of the Enlightened.
I do not mind basic questions, I have quite a few of those:
Where is Pink?
Is LM3886 a color code?
How does a BJT feel?
Electrolyte caps in Gatorade?
... Thought this was a "noobs unite!" forum, like Noobs uniting to form a decentralized mass of subjectively based and heavily opinionated information/kindofthing. And now there's people claiming there are experts about? I dunno about this, my mum would probably start rattling on about illuminati by now, saying something about the NSA increasing field strength on wireless transmitters to fry the brains of the Enlightened.
I do not mind basic questions, I have quite a few of those:
Where is Pink?
Is LM3886 a color code?
How does a BJT feel?
Electrolyte caps in Gatorade?
If there was any point at all in my previous posts it was:
I'm feeling free to ask stupid questions myself, and I hope everyone else does too. If we are afraid to ask about the basics, then maybe we are afraid to ask more advanced questions also, and everyone loses. What if someone asks a basic question that noone has ever thought of before?
The community benefits from people taking an interest, if it weren't for the questions and the desire for knowledge, there would not be a fantastic forum such as this.
If there is some person here, that has answers to my silly questions, and even bothers enough to post an answer to it. I will be happy, and I might stumble over a basic question from someone else that I have learned the answer to, maybe even through gained knowledge from a previous information exchange on this glorious forum.
And it might not be much at all, but I really do think it makes the world a better place, helping each other out, even if it's just a tiny little bit. If we stop spending time on the basics, giving a tiny portion of our time to others, maybe we will actually lose something valuable.
I'm feeling free to ask stupid questions myself, and I hope everyone else does too. If we are afraid to ask about the basics, then maybe we are afraid to ask more advanced questions also, and everyone loses. What if someone asks a basic question that noone has ever thought of before?
The community benefits from people taking an interest, if it weren't for the questions and the desire for knowledge, there would not be a fantastic forum such as this.
If there is some person here, that has answers to my silly questions, and even bothers enough to post an answer to it. I will be happy, and I might stumble over a basic question from someone else that I have learned the answer to, maybe even through gained knowledge from a previous information exchange on this glorious forum.
And it might not be much at all, but I really do think it makes the world a better place, helping each other out, even if it's just a tiny little bit. If we stop spending time on the basics, giving a tiny portion of our time to others, maybe we will actually lose something valuable.
There are 100 hours of video recorded in YouTube each minute.
Watching all of them to find out which ones we like would be exhausting and boring.
There is a Machine Learning algorithm behind YouTube to provide recommendations that help to navigate through the videos.
This is the new standard. Browsing for hours and hours on Ethernet is history. People are not lazy, they are overloaded.
The concept of forums is not optimal.
The users questions should be processed by computerized algorithms that take into consideration all treads and articles. The answer should be one single synthetize computerized answer. It should be representative of the most knowledgeable answer based on all the information available.
The role of the forum users should be to feed the algorithms database with any good and bad experiences, findings, errors / problems, etc. More, the database should be ultimately fed and continuously updated with the information from every other related forums, books, university and research articles…
And yes, again, we would have the same basic questions like:
- What is the best resistor for such application ?
- What is the best capacitor ?
- The best amplifier configuration ?
- Will it sound better replacing the OpAmp by another ?
But, whom wouldn’t like to see the answer !
Watching all of them to find out which ones we like would be exhausting and boring.
There is a Machine Learning algorithm behind YouTube to provide recommendations that help to navigate through the videos.
This is the new standard. Browsing for hours and hours on Ethernet is history. People are not lazy, they are overloaded.
The concept of forums is not optimal.
The users questions should be processed by computerized algorithms that take into consideration all treads and articles. The answer should be one single synthetize computerized answer. It should be representative of the most knowledgeable answer based on all the information available.
The role of the forum users should be to feed the algorithms database with any good and bad experiences, findings, errors / problems, etc. More, the database should be ultimately fed and continuously updated with the information from every other related forums, books, university and research articles…
And yes, again, we would have the same basic questions like:
- What is the best resistor for such application ?
- What is the best capacitor ?
- The best amplifier configuration ?
- Will it sound better replacing the OpAmp by another ?
But, whom wouldn’t like to see the answer !
Which is why this forum badly needs a wiki page that has in depth knowledge and spans over many terabytes of disk space.
But even a wiki won't be able to provide a clear and conscise answer that you describe as a "one single synthesized computerized answer".
All a wiki will provide is a page with a large amount of information on it.
You could say we've hit the impenetrable wall of the limit of human capabilities and cannot go any further.
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I'd rephrase that to "You could say we've hit the impenetrable wall of human stubbornness and cannot go any further without people being open to new possibilities."
Everyone has an opinion, and *most* of what you read on a forum like this is to a varying degree an opinion. It is when the opinions are regarded by the holders of those opinions as facts, that things start to fall apart.
edit: and yes of course this is an opinion
Tony.
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I would not be interested in the answer, except as a form of amusement.DASutton said:
Some youngsters seem to think that they can go through life without learning anything, because they can simply find answers from Google etc. They thus expect everyone else (who do know something) to merely feed Google with information. Three snags with this approach to life:
1. a brain which contains no facts and has no understanding is incapable of coherent intelligent thought, because facts are the raw material for thought and understanding is a prerequisite for intelligence
2. without understanding you cannot frame a meaningful question
3. without understanding you cannot grasp a correct answer to a question
Some people are lazy. They choose to fill their mind with trivia, then expect someone else to do their thinking for them.
Google is a 'popular' search engine, not one for scientific/ black and white type searches with specific criteria/boolean etc.. Altavista was good until Google came along and changed the paradigm. Now you need to use the + character to tell it you're serious about that term.. and means and! (pun ! intended
)
Good point, this I need to research. I Googled "how to get more accurate search results on Google", but which is the most accurate result?Now you need to use the + character to tell it you're serious about that term.. and means and! (pun ! intended
I miss website indexes.
You would go to a single webpage and simply browse and it would give you ideas on what you can do next in your projects.
That was awesome.
Its just like going to a video store or library and browsing instead of using netflix and searching for "unknown scifi movies that I don't know the name of or have ever heard of before." which is a thing that is just not possible with a search engine, you have to search for a list of recommended movies or books that other people have recommended you view, so you are going to end up being biased towards whatever opinion of theirs is best.
A search engine is a great way to stifle and control the information and opinions of others.
Orwell would be shocked to hear that we get all of our information and knowledge from just a few sources, wikipedia, google, youtube. So why do we do it?
You would go to a single webpage and simply browse and it would give you ideas on what you can do next in your projects.
That was awesome.
Its just like going to a video store or library and browsing instead of using netflix and searching for "unknown scifi movies that I don't know the name of or have ever heard of before." which is a thing that is just not possible with a search engine, you have to search for a list of recommended movies or books that other people have recommended you view, so you are going to end up being biased towards whatever opinion of theirs is best.
A search engine is a great way to stifle and control the information and opinions of others.
Orwell would be shocked to hear that we get all of our information and knowledge from just a few sources, wikipedia, google, youtube. So why do we do it?
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