Google Experimenting With Digg Style Voting On Search Results
At the moment the results of the program will only be stored per user and not applied to the general search index, so that sites buried (”I don’t like”) will not appear in future results for the user, where as sites voted up will stay up. Google Labs notes that “this is an experimental feature and may be available for only a few weeks,” still, who would have thought that Google would even experiment with Digg style social voting.
from TechCrunch
Ok. Google is a search tool. Google is an email provider that displays ads based on keywords from our messages. And Google is an advertising revenue data aggregator, allowing buyers to bid on valuable keywords culled from search histories.
At some point, the growth of those revenue streams reveal a terminal cycle when expansion will flatten (please, please, please: remember that I make up 92% of this stuff -- I know nothing about business).
They have lots of other products, but what makes more sense than allowing someone to vote up or down the results of their searches?
Google can only evaluate a search result based on linking. I link, you link, everywhere a link-link. So when I search, I see the most popular results first. Google's ability to sell ads is limited to my search terms. That particular stream of revenue mining has started to flatten out. Yes, the number of users continues to grow, but the predictable future income is already calculated. And apparently, Google didn't think it was enough.
So what this allows them to do it give you the power to dump bad links from your search results: these are possible black holes on the search ether. So when you dump a link, that opens room for another link to move up, opening up more positions for salable ad keywords.
And not only will this create more visible links, this could become a huge, worldwide game if Google opens it to the general index.
Imagine how much longer people would search if they could vote various links up or down?
Especially with the 2008 Presidential Election near. Candidates could recruit armies of students or librarian bloggers to vote for their pages and against their opponent's.
Sure Digg does this. But only Digg members Digg anything. Whereas the whole world Googles.
This decision could generate tens of billions of dollars in advertising revenue.
I think this is a win/win for everyone, since I believe that the Internet is just a huge craphole anyway. Except for Amazon.com: millions of products available 24 hours a day. (This post sponsored by Amazon.com). And Dvdtalk. And Gamecouch. And PMWF. (If you click on these links, I make a penny!) (not really.)
[note: I just found this cool article from the NYT. It looks like real people care about this stuff, too: "The only business plan in sight is ever more advertising. One might ask what will be left to advertise once everyone is aggregated." I guess Google just answered that; give us the opportunity to make more data. Sponsored by Doritos, "We'll Make More". Another damn fine product.]
