Google is search. It has competitors, but they are like barnacles at the bottom of a powerful ship, cutting off the Internet. No one searches better, and yet Google insists on ruining its stellar results with, naturally, artificial intelligence.
If you know me (and now I assume you do) I'm not a Luddite. I love new technologies and am especially intrigued by AI, which I have been covering for almost 20 years. Admittedly, the last two years are nothing like the previous 18, in which AI was understood as a powerful and growing technology sector that could automate processes, manage simple tasks behind the scenes and, to some extent, drive conversations. with chatbots.
Now, AI is like Frank's Red Hot Sauce slogan: “I put that shit on everything.” Algorithm and machine learning-driven technology are everywhere, an inescapable fact of modern life and a potential disruptor of the established way of doing almost anything.
Typically, emerging technology might operate on the periphery of the mainstream, a space that AI previously occupied for much of its existence. Now, the rush to be part of the AI revolution means AI is being applied at the center. If there's something you do every day or perhaps are doing now (checking email, writing letters, creating art), AI is ready to help. However, unlike traditional tools, AI may not wait for you to ask. “Suggestion” is a kind of AI default mode. Sometimes they are great, sometimes they are wrong. That's why I tend to prefer my AI to sit on the sidelines, waiting to be called upon, and definitely not (as Google has decided to implement Gemini in its search results) in an “AI overview.”
“Google is the first place I go when I want to find something on the web or discover almost anything. I not only type search terms into Google, but I also ask it questions regularly, and it almost always has the answers.” This is what I wrote 21 years ago about the then still relatively new search engine.
Please note the latter. She was typing natural language queries into the Google search box long before AI came into anyone's eyes. Google's search algorithm was so good that in 2003 it already understood your search intent. Since then, I have never thought much about what I write in that box. Spelling mistakes? It never mattered. Is there a word missing? It is not a problem. Google just notices.
The Google search box is not a place for careful thought. I usually write a rough, messy query, and if the results are too broad or, in the rare case, you get it wrong (never happens, TBH), refine the original query.
already the best
Google was always good enough in search, and for a long time, it was miles ahead of the competition. In recent years, Microsoft Bing, which admittedly takes a more nuanced approach to AI integration, has closed much of the gap, although I still think Google is better. Or I did.
Now we have AI overviews. Powered by Google Gemini, AI Overviews takes the large number of results you would receive for any query and boils them down to a more digestible summary. Google still considers AI overviews an experimental feature, which is why you don't always see them. 95% of my search results don't include them. I wonder if we all see less of them because the initial results were often wrong or strange.
Wrongness is a problem, but it's not my problem. My concern is why we need general descriptions of AI. It occurs to me that highlighting AI in a search result in this way is a fundamental misunderstanding of the purpose of online search, and comes from the King of Search.
AI Overview reminds me of a smart kid in class who constantly raises their hand to show you how smart they are. I don't blame them for being smart, but you can achieve the same result by doing well on your exams and not making others feel like idiots (this is a lesson I didn't learn early enough in elementary school).
AI Overview is Google's boast. Yes, your AI is smart and powerful, but the purpose of AI is not to be a masterpiece or some kind of search-and-summary magic trick. Google should use AI to improve the quality of its results without redoing them to show AI.
What I see is a giant search company so concerned about competition from Microsoft and Copilot that it felt the need to put AI Overviews results before its best product: search results. And you know what that does, right? It pushes search results further down the page and, depending on the screen (desktop or mobile), you may not even see traditional results.
Get out of my way
The other day, my adult son was scrolling through his phone and started cursing, “No, I don't want an overview of AI. Get this out of the way.” Of course, he shot a look in my direction as if I had something to do with it. My family often blames me for all technological weaknesses because I am “in the industry.”
In this case I agree with my son. There is simply no need to show AI summaries when the current results are so good and accurate. I'm not even going to get into the topic of how pushing these results will hurt (or kill) the content creators who have supported the search engine for a generation. Your search engine is nothing without our information… but that's a different post.
What worries me is that Google seems unaware that its efforts to keep up with the competition could hurt its most valuable product. People want search results and nothing more. Give them that and they will be Google search customers forever. Force them to scroll through AI overviews and you'll lose them to the competition.
The answer is simple: Google can remain a leader by taking the intelligence of Gemni AI and using it to improve search results, but without showing anyone how it does it. If Gemini is only allowed to exchange facts, this could make Google Search even more effective, and that's a win for Google and a win for its fans who only want to search on Google.
