A friend of the reporter wants to travel to Beijing during the National Day. He entered the keyword "Beijing tourism" in a search engine, and the top 20 search results were all advertisements of some travel companies, which surprised his friends.
More serious problems lie ahead. Lao Wang, a Sichuanese, has prostatitis. He searched for the disease on a search engine, and at the top of the search was a hospital called the General Staff Department. Lao Wang thought, what search engines recommend should be fair and objective, right? But it cost more than 10000 yuan, but the condition became more and more serious. Lao Wang didn't know that he had been tricked into making false medical advertisements-the advertisements were posted on the website of search engines by paying, and the search engines "took" patients to find them.
"Is the search engine still considering the feelings of our users? Why do advertisements always appear on the front page of search, but the information that our users really need is submerged in it? " In the last half month, many users and readers have sent such questions to reporters.
Our reporter found that when searching for hotels, hotels, travel, mobile phones, computers, medical care, education, gifts, liquor, heart disease and other pages, a large number of advertisers and agents flooded the pages, which greatly limited the users' search results.
"Finding, finding quickly and finding accurately" is an unwritten standard for users and industries to a good search engine, and it is also a "user experience" that affects the key indicators of search engines. In "The World is Flat", Friedman analyzed "the driving force of 10 to flatten the world", among which the emergence of search engines was especially praised, because search engines enabled people to find information, products and services more quickly ... But according to the current situation of "unable to find, slow to find and inaccurate to find", this writer who was praised by countless people was obviously in China.
Is Friedman suspected of speaking out of turn? In fact, Friedman's search engine speculation is based on certain institutional basis, moral environment and commercial principles. In my opinion, these are the basic prerequisites of search engines.
However, looking around China's search engines, these basic premises have been widely questioned. Is this a natural defect of search engines or driven by commercial interests? Why are search engines indifferent to this?
The commercialization of search engines is rampant.
A secret meeting revealed the tip of the iceberg of China's search engine.
On September 23rd and 24th, 2008, during the China Internet Conference, various giants from search engines gathered together and quietly held a search engine conference. The theme of this conference is: SEO in the era of search engine marketing.
The so-called SEO, that is, search engine optimization, can also be called "search engine optimization". This is a way to use the search rules of search engines to improve the ranking of destination websites in related search engines-through content selection and arrangement, keyword distribution, adding internal links and reverse links, and even bidding ranking, etc., the ranking of searched websites can be improved in a targeted manner.
"We discussed how SEO and advertising can better penetrate into every corner of search engines." A participant revealed to reporters after the meeting.
This sends a message: search engines are seeking more business models, or optimizing the current business models to obtain more business benefits.
"Unlike foreign search engines, which generally adopt the direct selling model, domestic search engines use a large number of free search experiences to attract attention and traffic, and then mainly adopt the agency advertising model to launch the bidding ranking or advertising profit model." Dong Haiping, head of China Anti-Rogue Software Alliance, believes that the business models of various search engines in China are no secret.
According to the statistics of a consulting company in China, among the numerous search results provided by search engines, 98% of users browse the first three pages. Only 2% of users will read the content after the third page. The first five items on the first page are the most valuable positions in the search page.
Does this mean that top or home search is trustworthy or recommended? The answer is no, to some extent, the top search ranking is the best embodiment of the commercialization of search engines-many advertisers have spent money on search engines to compete for this position. This means that after the search engine is over-commercialized, it is difficult to get rid of the embarrassing disadvantages of misleading netizens to choose.
From September 20th to 25th, our reporter randomly surveyed 50 users. When asked whether search engines are too commercialized, 70% of the answers are yes, because many search results are advertisements.
"Misunderstanding, misunderstanding." In the process of our reporter's investigation, Baidu, Google and other search companies have repeatedly said that they are unwilling to talk more about whether the commercialization of their search engines is rampant.
Liu Jianguo, former CEO of Baidu, is currently the president of Aibang. Com, once revealed that Baidu search results rank no more than 20% on the home page, and the rest are free search results. However, it is worth noting that Liu Jianguo admitted that this 20% bidding ranking was also manually audited.
In fact, during the interview, the reporter found that more than one insider of major search companies was worried about some practices to improve performance. They said that with the continuous development of the search market, many colleagues realized the contradiction between the search experience of netizens and excessive commercialization, but the top leaders did not seem to come up with some good methods.
Depth analysis
Search engines are vulnerable to money.
Faced with the temptation of economic interests, the fairness of search engines is gradually disappearing.
Internet is called eyeball economy, traffic equals wealth, and search engines are no exception. According to the reporter's investigation, search business has become the biggest hope for major Internet companies to get out of the cold winter after online games, so major Internet companies have advanced to this continent. On September 17, Netease found a way to find the official sword; In addition, Alibaba also intends to search for services, which is why Baidu and Taobao have recently caused a sensation in the industry.
The best example is Baidu. If Baidu was listed on NASDAQ in 2005, investors still regarded it as China's version of Google, most investors should have believed that even Google could hardly shake Baidu's leading edge in China. As of September 24, Baidu's share price has reached $275.5, ten times the issue price of $27 at the time of listing. In 2008, when the "winterization theory" prevailed, Baidu's profit in the second quarter increased by 87% to $39 million, and its revenue doubled to $65,438+0./kloc-0. 7 billion.
But it is worth noting that most of Baidu's revenue comes from bidding rankings. Baidu CEO Li Yanhong has publicly admitted that more than 80% of Baidu's performance comes from bidding ranking. Yao Jinbo, CEO of 58 City, one of Baidu's customers, once revealed that there are about several million yuan of funds invested in Baidu search engine keywords every year, but this only belongs to Baidu? Medium-sized customers.
Google's business model has even been questioned around the world. For many years, although Google has been looking for ways to expand its revenue, such as trying banner display advertisements, below-the-line, radio and TV advertisements, the vast majority of Google's revenue today still depends on the text ads business put into search engine search results and third-party websites.
"Paid advertising is still the most important source of income for major search engines." A search marketing expert pointed out that, on the one hand, the rising performance has led to the insensitivity of search engines to user experience; on the other hand, search engines and advertising agencies are inextricably linked. Paradoxically, search engines will choose to "sacrifice" the user experience more often.
Moral Paradox of Search Engine
In fact, the excessive commercialization of search engines not only reduces the search user experience, but also causes netizens to question the ethics of search engines. The recent "* * * * * * *" incident was directed at Baidu's search practice.
Some Baidu people said that they just put the websites related to the keyword content searched by users in a higher position. In addition, after some users expressed dissatisfaction, Baidu began to add the word "promotion" under these advertisements for easy identification. Google, Soso, Youdao, etc. It is said that paid search results are placed outside the main search list.
But none of these statements can hide the fact that whoever has more money and whose money is earlier will appear in front of the search results. For netizens, for example, if you want to search the quality of a product, the top information may mostly be the name of the channel that sells the product, and even contribute to the search engine unconsciously. For example, Lao Wang didn't think that he had contributed at least ten yuan to the search engine. The problem is that the voice of users questioning corporate ethics does not seem to affect the impressive performance of searchers with large user groups at all.
When users are increasingly dissatisfied with the search engine experience, a large number of lawsuits have appeared in the search engine industry, and they are still increasing recently? ? ? ? ? ? The lawsuit is that the company sued the search engine for placing its search ranking too low in non-paid search, even because it was blocked by the search engine. For example, Doremi Chinese Network sued Google for improper search. Doremi Chinese website said that the search for the keyword "Doremi Chinese website" in Google didn't show the company's website until item 37 of the query results, so Doremi company received many complaints and responsibilities from customers. Doremi Chinese website immediately took Google to court for "violating the principle of equal treatment".
Even Ding Lei, CEO of Netease, publicly "bombarded" the current domestic search engine industry at the press conference: "Search engine companies favor their own products and businesses through search, and intervening in search results has become an unspoken rule in the industry."
The moral deficiency of search engines has attracted the attention of relevant departments. Yan, a spokesperson for the state, said that in addition to directly supervising and cracking down on fake websites, some comprehensive portals and search engines have been communicated, asking them to take social responsibility as their responsibility and take measures to clean up illegal drug advertisements. "Because drugs are so special, patients buy drugs just to treat diseases. If they provide false medical information, search engines will help others abuse them and kill them for money. "
Multi-perspective
Who will stop the moral deficiency of search engines?
Moderator: Our reporter Huang Xu.
Interviewer: Yu, chief lawyer of Beijing Shengfeng Law Firm.
Senior programmer and netizen: Zhang Qunyi
Our reporter learned that in the eyes of Americans, search engines are social tools and need to bear their own moral responsibilities and obey the corresponding supervision. Therefore, the United States Federal Trade Commission (FTC) requires searchers to disclose how advertising fees affect website rankings, and requires searchers to set up "clear" signs to divide paid and free search results, otherwise they will take legal action to enforce them.
But in China, there is a lack of corresponding restrictions on search engines. Who will stop the moral deficiency that restricts search engines? Our reporter talked with Yu, director of Beijing Shengfeng Law Firm, who has an in-depth analysis of the Internet, and Feng, a senior programmer netizen.
Reporter: At present, are there over-commercialization phenomena in major domestic search engines? What do you think of this?
Zhang Qunyi: As a programmer, I often need to go to small websites. But one day, I suddenly couldn't find it through the search engine. I continued to search for related issues and found that because there is no advertisement in the search engine, the website is called blocked by search. With the popularity of the Internet and the explosive growth of network information, people rely more and more on search engines. At this time, the search engine is not only a tool for searching information, but also has a far-reaching impact on society. This excessive pursuit of commercialization and neglect of user experience is obviously immoral.
Y: At present, the mainstream search engine operators are all profit-making commercial companies. Therefore, search engines will certainly have a lot of commercial activities, and even the ultimate goal of search engines is to achieve their own profit goals. Other aspects, such as morality, are probably just means to realize its profit.
Reporter: Are there any rules that search engines need to abide by and restrict at present? Do you need to bear moral and legal responsibilities?
Zhang Qunyi: As far as I know, in the United States, search engines need to bear their own moral responsibilities and obey the corresponding supervision. In China, we have not heard of this kind of regulation. But shouldn't search engines be responsible? I don't think so. As I said just now, search engines have had a far-reaching impact on society. Just like a expressway, you can't just think about making money. If there is no corresponding restriction and moral responsibility, it may endanger the public's right to know and information transparency. This is the social responsibility of enterprises.
Y: Search engine is a special product. This product is developed and owned by a company, so he is the maker of this product rule. Unless the search engine infringes on the trademark, patent and copyright of others when providing search services, it shall bear legal responsibility. Therefore, at present, there is no legal regulation to regulate and prohibit search engine services. According to the principle that nothing is forbidden by law, the commercial operation of search engines, even if it is highly commercialized, is only a matter of business ethics and user experience, not a legal issue, as long as it does not violate relevant laws and regulations. Frankly speaking, search engines lack supervision, and the trend of simply pursuing commercial interests is being amplified.
Reporter: On the one hand, there is a lack of supervision over search engines, on the other hand, users are increasingly dissatisfied with the experience of search engines. How can we limit the excessive commercialization of search engines?
Zhang Qunyi: Today, some search engines are based on users. Users may also abandon them and a fair and socially responsible search engine will be accepted by users. Therefore, even if there is no law, I think search engines should consider what to do. This is not only to stick to the moral bottom line of an enterprise, but also to protect the public's right to know, and at the same time, it has not laid a foundation for its future destiny. You make your own open rules, but I can always vote against them with my feet, right?
Yu: For Baidu, Google, Yahoo and other mainstream search engine manufacturers, each company has its own technical rules for collecting, crawling and sorting out search engine information, and even its commercialization model, which should undoubtedly be respected. However, paying too much attention to user experience will inevitably affect the realization of its commercial interests, so that it cannot stand on the market; If we pay too much attention to profitability, the user experience will inevitably decline, and we will lose in the battle for users, and the profitability is not optimistic. Therefore, the two should not be neglected.
Therefore, I believe that due to the increasing social impact of search engines, it is necessary for the relevant state departments to conduct research and legislation specifically for search engines, and make necessary regulations on the behavior of search engines to avoid the negative impact caused by excessive commercialization of search engines.