Many years ago they removed search operators that allowed for exact string matching. At that point I knew it was a circus
Then I noticed Google started limiting the number of results for users who are "logged out"
Then, several years ago, Google disabled public access to the cache
At that point it was pretty clear where this was going
When they started requiring Javascript I began preparing alternatives
There was a user agent string suggested by @superkuh here that avoided the Javascript "requirement" for quite a while
But not too long ago that string stopped working
The good news is the alternatives, all free (no Kagi), are generally working great. There are some gems I would never have found if I kept using Google
There might still be some magic strings out there that can be used to avoid Google's Javascript
But it's not worth the effort anymore
There is still Google News and Google Scholar, no Javascript required, but I am preparing for those to be ruined eventually, too
Back in the day I used scroogle.org. That was a great project while it lasted
I'm thinking of trying the SERPAPI free tier since Google is suing them and they might not be around much longer
In the early days of www search engines, it was common to brag about how many pages were searched to find the delivered results
Today, I don't think anyone pays attention to this anymore
We know that not all searches tap into the fuil index. All the focus is on the popular searches (largest audience for advertising). To the most make money, the search engine does not need to have the most comprehensive search, www users today do not shop for search engines, it just needs to be the "default search engine". Google has that taken care of, owning and controlling the www browser and the mobile OS, paying billions to be the default in other OS and partnering with other browsers
With LLMs we see companies today bragging about size. Grand claims like "the sum of all human knowledge". Also the scale of data centers and "compute"
But over time, will "AI" users care. Perhaps one company's "AI" will become the most popular and the "default" LLM. It will have the largest audience
And that's all that matters when the "business model" is data collection, surveillance and advertising services
Many years ago they removed search operators that allowed for exact string matching. At that point I knew it was a circus
Then I noticed Google started limiting the number of results for users who are "logged out"
Then, several years ago, Google disabled public access to the cache
At that point it was pretty clear where this was going
When they started requiring Javascript I began preparing alternatives
There was a user agent string suggested by @superkuh here that avoided the Javascript "requirement" for quite a while
But not too long ago that string stopped working
The good news is the alternatives, all free (no Kagi), are generally working great. There are some gems I would never have found if I kept using Google
There might still be some magic strings out there that can be used to avoid Google's Javascript
But it's not worth the effort anymore
There is still Google News and Google Scholar, no Javascript required, but I am preparing for those to be ruined eventually, too
Back in the day I used scroogle.org. That was a great project while it lasted
I'm thinking of trying the SERPAPI free tier since Google is suing them and they might not be around much longer
Google search is story of diminishing returns