Google is a big company–so big they created a new one called Alphabet to stuff Google into. Since starting their search engine in 1997, Google has come to dominate both web searches (92%) and web browsers (65%), with Google search and Google Chrome, respectively. Google is a company built on advertising and harvesting user data. They are big enough now that they are trying and in some cases succeeding in pushing web standards that suit them, forcing others to follow along.
Part of the perpetuation of Google as the dominant player comes from writers using “Google” as a generic verb. You don’t search, you “Google.” This is bad because it entrenches Google needlessly, reinforcing in people’s minds that there is only one way to search on the internet, and that is by going to google.com.
Google’s dominance has led us to a point where it regularly steers search results toward SEO garbage that benefits the company (and those it does business with), but not necessarily the users. They have promised moves to improve searching, even as they work to cripple most ad blockers.
Here’s the thing, though.
Look at this screenshot from an article published today on engadget about finding a good productivity mouse:
I am honestly perplexed why any editorial staff on these sites would allow writers to do this. I wonder if the author of the piece had written “Bing around” (yes, I know, it is funny to say that out loud), would an editor have run a red line through it and suggested something else. What would they have suggested?
This may seem like a nitpick, but it bugs me because:
- It is sloppy and lazy writing
- It perpetuates a commercial product (Google search) as the “proper” way to do or use something
In conclusion, use DuckDuckGo. Or even Bing. Or one of the boutique search engines in closed beta that think people will pay for a “good” search experience (it’s possible!). But mostly, stop using “Google” to mean “search.”
