On Bad Approaches To Search

GrokLaw, a blog run by a paralegal who must be hepped up on triple espressos, has posted an interesting journey into the seamy side of paid search. Basically, this fellow noticed a significant discrepancy between Google and MSN’s search results, and set out to understand why. This is a great illustration of a theme that is fundamental to Google’s mojo: purity of results. MSN comes across as basically sold to the highest bidder, with competitive manipulations on top of that. It’s not a pretty picture. When MSFT launches its new search engine, one hopes they will keep this in mind.