Google Block-Sites Feature Kills Spam, Keeps Algorithm

Google announced the addition of a feature for its search engine that lets users block out links to domains in future query results.

When a searcher returns to Google after looking at a Web page, there will be a new link next to “Cached” that reads “Block all example.com results,” according to the Google Blog. Clicking it will alert the search engine to omit that domain name for all future searches carried out by that user.

“You’ve probably had the experience where you’ve clicked a result and it wasn’t quite what you were looking for,” Amay Champaneria and Beverly Yang wrote in the post. “Many times you’ll head right back to Google. Perhaps the result just wasn’t quite right, but sometimes you may dislike the site in general, whether it’s offensive, pornographic or of generally low quality. For times like these, you’ll start seeing a new option to block particular domains from your future search results.”

The feature, which rolls out today, could have further implications for rankings in the search engine’s algorithm.

“While we’re not currently using the domains people block as a signal in ranking, we’ll look at the data and see whether it would be useful as we continue to evaluate and improve our search results in the future,” according to the post.

Notice Block all Facebook.com Results on the right

A Simple Solution

The “hide sites” feature, which follows a recent revitalization of Google’s algorithm, is the simple yet perfect tonic for Google’s recent search-engine spam ailments.

Recently, I wrote an article comparing curated search-engines like Blekko to traditional algorithmic ones like Google or Bing. In this post, I argued that Google was on the verge of being toppled by spammy results and information that was pushed to the top of organic listings by those who had learned to game the algorithm. This being the case, curated sites like Blekko or Quora would gain prominence. These were sites that gave users a say in the listings that turned up. At the end of the post, I said the best system would be a hybrid, one that harnessed the algorithmic power but also gave people a say. It was a simple solution that would take advantage of both worlds. The algorithm would find results fast, but people would begin to bury things that were worthless or aberrant.

Google’s addition today did exactly that.