Tech: No google?

Subject: BS. Tech: No google?
From: AllisonA(Animaterra)
Date: 26 Feb 03 - 07:12 AM

For some reason, on my computer at home, I can't access http://www.google.com/- I get "Cannot find server" or "Ths page cannot be displayed". I use Internet Explorer on a pc. My SO can't get Google.com on his mac but can get Google.ca (the Canadian vs) but I can't (we live in the same rural village about 100 miles south of the Canadian border) ! Whazzup?

Subject: RE: BS: No google?
From: CapriUni
Date: 26 Feb 03 - 07:27 AM

I tried it just now and it came through fine.... Huh. Mysterious.

The thought of no Google is indeed a scary one. You have my sympathies.

Subject: RE: BS: No google?
From: GUEST,sorefingers
Date: 26 Feb 03 - 07:30 AM

Damaged data?

You can get around the problem by going to Yahoo, type google into the search box. When the result loads, click on the Yahoo link.

This always works for me, and I have many problems with slow or non loading pages.

Subject: RE: BS: No google?
From: Ella who is Sooze
Date: 26 Feb 03 - 07:45 AM

I've been googling all morning here... no problems at all!

Subject: RE: BS: No google?
From: catspaw49
Date: 26 Feb 03 - 08:22 AM

Allison, I've been getting the same problem too for a few days. If I scroll down and pull up an old Google search, it comes right up and works fine. Kinda' weird........

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: No google?
From: Noreen
Date: 26 Feb 03 - 08:53 AM

No probs accessing www.google.com here in the UK (you'll be pleased to know!)

Subject: RE: BS: No google?
From: Amos
Date: 26 Feb 03 - 09:20 AM

Hmmm...and they say nicotine is addictive!!


"Hi -- my name's Pat, and...well...I'm a Googlaholic, I guess....".
"Hiiiiiiiiiii Pat!!!!!!"

But this is of course a very different thing. We know what carbon-chain molecules, the long ones like nicotine and such, do to the brain that makers it addictive.

But what does information from Google do to the brain that makes it dependent?


Scaaaaary......

LOL!!

A

Subject: RE: BS: No google?
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 26 Feb 03 - 09:28 AM

Try Dogpile instead.

Subject: RE: BS: No google?
From: GUEST,.gargoyle
Date: 26 Feb 03 - 09:32 AM

It appears that your local township falls under the governmental control of the Chineese. (It was simply how things got divided up by the Tri-Lateral-Commission when they installed the new-world-order over the weekend.)

Don't fret....use http://www.dogpile.com....it uses mutiple search engines, including google, and therefore returns a more useful product.

Have fun!

Sincerely,
Gargoyle

Subject: RE: BS: No google?
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 26 Feb 03 - 10:02 AM

I have Google as my homepage on IE. I get "cannot be displayed" messages about 5% of the time when I log on. It's probably just a traffic issue as it almost always connects on the second attempt. Google probably gets more hits during a day than any other website on the net. Some traffic-related problems are bound to crop up.

Bruce

Subject: RE: BS: No google?
From: nutty
Date: 26 Feb 03 - 10:20 AM

I had problems getting G00GLE all day yesterday ......actually posted a thread about it........ but all seems OK today.

I am in the UK , have an NTL cable broadband connection and run Netscape as my browser.

Subject: RE: BS: No google?
From: Bill D
Date: 26 Feb 03 - 10:30 AM

Yogi Berra once said of a restaurant.."Nobody goes there anymore, it's too crowded."

Well, that's the way it is with Google....I keep a list of URLs handy to 'test' in order to be sure it is not my own ISP...and if it is JUST Google now and then having a temporary problem, I use FastSearch (Allthe Web), which indexes almost as many pages...and it often faster, as it isn't overloaded!

Altavista is STILL excellent...and Teoma is good....and there are LOTS of good search engines. (Bet they wish THEY had thought up a short, cute name!)

Subject: RE: BS: No google?
From: nutty
Date: 26 Feb 03 - 10:42 AM

It seemed more than that yesterday Bill ..... I could get some of my regular sites to work .... amazingly Mudcat was one..... but others (eg Age Concern)wouldn't work at all.

That seems to indicate that the problem was not just with Google but was possilby an overload problem with the net in general and depended on how you were being routed to a site.

Subject: RE: BS: No google?
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 26 Feb 03 - 10:44 AM

Another easy to use (and refine) multi-engine search vehicle is Metacrawler. This was my engine of preference until Google came along (ah, we achademics, so fickle when another pretty research tool comes along!)

The traffic level was no doubt the reason you received the error message.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: No google?
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 26 Feb 03 - 10:45 AM

however, we academics had better remember to type!

Subject: RE: BS: No google?
From: Bill D
Date: 26 Feb 03 - 10:54 AM

sometimes it IS a router that is down, making everything slow, like when a traffic accident at a major intersection makes too many cars detour down side streets.

Sometimes http://www.internettrafficreport.com/main.htm can help explain it, if you can get to IT!

Subject: RE: BS: No google?
From: Bill D
Date: 26 Feb 03 - 10:56 AM

the FAQ there includes this:

"Q: What is a "router?"
A: Routers are traffic cop computers on Internet backbones responsible for redirecting data from sender to receiver. When major routers slow down or stop, it has an adverse affect on Internet data flow in that region.?"

Subject: RE: BS: No google?
From: GUEST,The Dreaded Guest
Date: 26 Feb 03 - 04:09 PM

Google is anti-gun but allows porn searches. Your ISP might have chosen to block google. One phone call from an out-raged parent can do that, from what I've heard.

Subject: RE: BS: No google?
From: Bill D
Date: 26 Feb 03 - 04:37 PM

just how is it anti-gun??? Google just found me all I didn't want to know about AK-47s

and then I entered 'gun rifle pistol' and got HUNDREDS of hits...your paranoia now extends to inanimate programming?

Subject: RE: BS: No google?
From: GUEST,Q
Date: 26 Feb 03 - 04:49 PM

On cable in Canada, always get google.ca rapidly.
No delays, but the server must be pulling this trick- if I find and click on a website that lists mp3, up comes "illegal operation" and I am closed off. I don't use mp3, but some of these sites also have lyrics that I am looking for.

Subject: RE: BS: No google?
From: Bill D
Date: 26 Feb 03 - 06:07 PM

must be a Canadian thing (or YOUR ISP)...I have no problem finding MP3s, or downloading them...(legal ones only, of course!)

Subject: RE: BS: No google?
From: GUEST,The Dreaded Guest
Date: 26 Feb 03 - 06:26 PM

Just go to Google and type in 'google anti-gun'. They may be anti-gun, but they're not too bright if their search engine turns up stuff like this:

Anti-gun Google

Subject: RE: BS: No google?
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 26 Feb 03 - 06:58 PM

Dreaded Guest--That article says Google has been doing this for years, but Google hasn't been around for years. Only for a couple, anyway, not a lot of them, as this would seem to imply.

Subject: RE: BS: No google?
From: GUEST,.gargoyle
Date: 27 Feb 03 - 12:10 AM

Cripes I love chewing on the runny butts of silly sages: - Google hasn't been around for years

The Smithsonian "Wayback Macine" shows google's existence steming from NOVEMBER 1998.

Your unfortunate existence within this forum dates from only October 2001....

Park your pompus ass in the corner and sulk awhile.

Sincerely,
Gargoyle

Curses on Gates, Max, and Offer for allowing such stooges EASY access to international communication.

Subject: RE: Tech: No google?
From: Pseudolus
Date: 27 Feb 03 - 11:22 AM

Dogpile is nice if you can't get to Google directly but I would stop short of calling it a better product. I did a comparison search looking for "Jesus Christ Superstar MP3" in both dogpile and directly in Google. Through Dogpile I got 10 hits. Directly through Google I got 8,520. I used Dogpile all the time until I found Google.....


Frank

Subject: RE: Tech: No google?
From: Bill D
Date: 27 Feb 03 - 11:35 AM

dreaded guest...if you READ the whole page at the link you provide, it says, their policy of not accepting ads for guns or gun parts does NOT affect their searching. You can still search FOR guns and go buy guns from gun dealers...YOU JUST CANT BUY AN AD FROM GOOGLE...

In this, they have a perfect right to make this decision. Refusing to actively PROMOTE is not the same as censoring.

and as for me, I'd MUCH rather the world had more porn if it would reduce the number of guns! (yeah, I'm outnumbered...so?)

Subject: RE: Tech: No google?
From: GUEST,The Dreaded Guest
Date: 27 Feb 03 - 11:48 AM

Bill...Google is anti-gun. They're fanatics. Who knows how they've interfered with gun searches in their over-zealousness.

As far as porn, you'll be getting your wish for increased porn traffic soon. Google and other companies are part of the corporate fascistic takeover of America (that which has been socialized for 70+ years is now being sold off to the private corporations that put Bush into power), and one of the things the corporate-fascistic govt is looking at is 'regulating porn'. They want to do it to 'stop exploitation of the women'. Want to do it 'for the children'. But these new govt officials are organized criminals, so that'd be like Al Capone saying he cornered the market in Prohibition-era alcohol for some altruistic reason.

Your government is about to 'regulate' internet porn, which means the child pornographers will be government-sponsored. Govt-run whore houses using child sex slaves. So you'll be getting lots of new porn before long, while Google incrementally eliminates the Second Amendment.

Subject: RE: Tech: No google?
From: Pseudolus
Date: 27 Feb 03 - 11:56 AM

Wow, you're right, screw Iraq, let's bomb google!!!!

Subject: RE: Tech: No google?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 27 Feb 03 - 12:02 PM

When Mudcat is down, please don't get mad. As this thread proves, Google goes down, too. I'd say I get an error message close to twenty percent of the times I try Google. Most of the time, I get in on the second or third try - but I do get a lot of error messages.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Tech: No google?
From: BuckMulligan
Date: 27 Feb 03 - 01:07 PM

Somehow the notion of Dreaded Guest labeling anyone else a "fanatic" just cracked me up. Thanks, DG.

Subject: RE: Tech: No google?
From: GUEST,KateG
Date: 27 Feb 03 - 04:25 PM

If google's not working, try ixquick.com another metasearch engine. Lots of hits, and when you click on them they pop up in their own windows which makes backtracking to the original search MUCH easier --you just close the window.

KateG (sorry no cookie on this machine)

Subject: RE: Tech: No google?
From: Rapparee
Date: 27 Feb 03 - 04:36 PM

also try metacrawler (www.metacrawler.com), the librarian's second choice these days when Google is down (and first choice for a lot of things). Remember, no one search engine has everything, no matter what they'd have you believe.

Subject: RE: Tech: No google?
From: Bill D
Date: 27 Feb 03 - 04:40 PM

"Who knows how they've interfered with gun searches..."

why, that's easy! ...just run your search in 27 OTHER search engines, and collate the results against Google...please...try it....(it ought to keep you busy for a year or two and out of our hair!)

If there's anything specific you can't find about guns in Google, DO come back in a couple years and let us know.

"fanatic" search engine ....*big grin*

Subject: RE: Tech: No google?
From: AllisonA(Animaterra)
Date: 27 Feb 03 - 04:42 PM

Well, apparently it's the route or something- my kids have IE saved on the desktop, and when I click onto it, they've got it set to Google and I get there with no problem! Go figure! Thanks for all the, er, interesting advice.

Subject: RE: Tech: No google?
From: Bill D
Date: 27 Feb 03 - 04:49 PM

oh, By the way!..the interesting things about Google and other search engines is how they support themselves and who is buying/merging with whom!......take a look here

Subject: RE: Tech: No google?
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 27 Feb 03 - 06:36 PM

Hey, Gargoyle, Google was a tiny little Beta site for a long time before it went mainstream. It doesn't count if nobody knew about it.

Subject: RE: Tech: No google?
From: GUEST
Date: 27 Feb 03 - 06:42 PM

I used to respect you, Bill

Linking to the Washington Post???

Please

Subject: RE: Tech: No google?
From: Mudlark
Date: 27 Feb 03 - 09:32 PM

KateG...thanks for the tip about xquick....it IS quick, and I really like the popup windows...

Subject: RE: Tech: No google?
From: Bill D
Date: 27 Feb 03 - 09:36 PM

"Linking to the Washington Post???"

why, shucks, iffn a feller cain't trust his home town newspaper, who CAN he trust? Mayhap the Washington TIMES? Rev. Moon would be so pleased!

Subject: RE: Tech: No google?
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 01 Mar 03 - 10:24 PM

As a confirmed "gun nut" from a long way back, I'll contribute to our paranoid Guests blatherwocky by stating that I have not been offended by anything I've seen of their purported "anti-gun" bias. (But then we anarchists only discuss such stuff in our secret meetings - definitely not on the internet. ;-)

A more appropriate issue relating to Google is related in a recent PC Magazine article - Is Google Invading Your Privacy?.

(I'll note that this site requests that you register to enter, but I think the link will work without it.)

There has been some complaint that Google "puts spyware on your machine," and keeps track of everywhere you go on the internet. There is a "grain of truth" in what is alleged, but Google is quite open about what they do; and what they are tracking seems to be essential to providing the kind of indexing service that users seem to want.

If you just "go Google," they may track you searched for, and what sites from the result are clicked, and there is even the suggestion (unconfirmed) that they may record "the people who went here went there next" kind of stuff.

If you install the Google Toolbar - which is, incidentally, a very handy gadget - and if you enable "Advanced Search," you are clearly told that it also enables a degree of "tracking" of what you search for, what you find, and which "hits" you follow up on. These seem like perfectly reasonable and necessary kinds of information that an adequate search service needs and I have agreed, knowingly, to let them do their thing.

You are also told, at the toolbar download site, how to turn the damned thing off if you decide later that you don't want them to follow you somewhere.

I've seen some pretty hysterical/paranoid ranting about this elsewhere, and the linked article takes a reasonably sane view. It does list some unconfirmed allegations about what Google may do, but if you apply a little rational thought to your reading of it, you'll be able to tell which is known and which is guesswork.

John

Subject: RE: Tech: No google?
From: Bill D
Date: 01 Mar 03 - 11:30 PM

it is well to note that the Google toolbar only works on MSIE....but I have 'almost' the same functions in Opera by choosing the right options in their long list of toolbar configurations...and in other browsers like Netscape and Mozilla and Phoenix...(and even in IE) one can get BookMarklets little scriptlets which will do all sorts of neat tricks in browsing and browser window handling...

Subject: RE: Tech: No google?
From: nutty
Date: 02 Mar 03 - 02:38 AM

An alternative search engine to google has emerged from the "Just Jeeves" company.

www.teoma.com

I have used it and found it very efficient when searching for song lyrics,

Subject: RE: Tech: No google?
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 02 Mar 03 - 05:10 AM

One of the nice things about the Google tool bar is that it makes it a one-click task to search for images. I'm told, though, that "by preference," Google does not search .org (non-profit) sites. They may pick up a few when they crawl for links on other sites, but d...it, that's where the good art is. (Maybe that's why the 'cat doesn't come up more often there?)

If you're not really careful about how you form your search, you can end up with several hundred pictures of peoples' little rug rats - and other "vanity postings" instead of the masterpiece you're looking for.

The real purpose in posting the link about Google "snooping" was just to give people a warning that there has been some noise about it, so that they can make their choices about what to permit with some awareness of what may be going on. Unimaginable to me that anyone would install their toolbar without reading all the fine print in their EULA, but I suppose some poeple might.

An associated question is -- do we have any idea what similar stuff the other favorite search engines are doing.

Google pretty much slaps you in the face with their "privacy policy," at least if you go to the Google home page, but I've never seen a similarly open explanation of any of the others. Of course, it also never occured to me to look for it.

John

Subject: RE: Tech: No google?
From: Bill D
Date: 02 Mar 03 - 11:44 AM

if I understood the article, Google only collects info about your habits beyond the search you entered 'if' you use the toolbar...and I don't.

They say that " Many times, after giving you a list of Web sites that match your search, Google will also record which sites you actually visited. "Google may choose to exhibit its search results in the form of a 'URL redirecter,'" reads Google's main privacy policy. "When Google uses a URL redirecter, if you click on a URL from a search result, information about the click is sent to Google."

One of the reasons I use Opera is this section of the Opera privacy features.
"Privacy
Enable referrer logging

It is common practice for Web sites to refer to each other. Many Web sites make a note of which page you came from, and behave accordingly. Whether or not you take issue with this is up to you, but disabling this option will prevent this kind of logging.

Note: Some sites may not work properly if you turn off referrer logging.

'Enable automatic redirection'

Some Web pages redirect you to another site. This is not really a security problem, but can waste your time. Opera therefore allows you to turn this feature off."
----------------------------------------------------------------
for quick image searches, I have a toolbar button with a dropdown menu that allows me to use Google image search, AlltheWeb image search, or AltaVista image search....and they have VERY different interfaces and result patterns, so I like having all 3 to choose from.

the only point, John, in mentioning all this is that there are very often lots of alternate ways to achieve 'approximately' the same results on a computer, as I'm sure *big grin* you realize. And some tricks are still able to afford a modicum of privacy and independence from Mickey$oft and other's attempts to monitor, direct, control and influence MY life and ultimately, my $$$$.

I am not sure how it will play out in the future, or whether Linux will ever give Windows serious competition, etc...but, for now, I LIKE being able to set my browser to accept cookies, and then have those cookies 'disposed of' as I direct afterwards.

As much as I appreciate Google, I don't care for the implications of using their toolbar....I think that just the fact that it is an IE only application makes me uncomfortable. I suspect that Opera would be able to limit what the toolbar did, and Google simple wont allow that.

Subject: RE: Tech: No google?
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 02 Mar 03 - 04:15 PM

Bill D -

One of the things I picked up on in the article is that if you use Google at all - tool bar or not - they still do track some of what you do, probably in the same ways that the other search engines do, and probably only while you're "in Google."

In order to make any search engine useful, there has to be some collection of "preferences." The web is just too big for any searching mechanism to index it all. It would be safe to assume that the majority of search engines at least keep track of how many people look at the sites they index and how many people look for/at a given kind of information. The information is much more useful to them if it also correlates "people who search for this look at that" so you can assume that some information of this kind is collected by most.

I see this "expected statistical gathering" as something necessary in order to improve the search process, although a statistical method may be one of the reasons - as in your local bookstore - an unintelligent search for music turns up little music and a lot of BS on fancults and other performer marketing stuff. That seems to be what the majority of the population believes they want, having been told so by so much advertising.

I don't, on principle, have any problem with the legitimate "click counting" that's needed; and although I'm not a "majority group" user, I don't really mind them targeting "teeny-boppers with bucks" - the likely ultimate result of the statistical method. (Note - the TBWB group includes a lot of really old people.)

Unfortunately, in our advertising-driven (remember when you could say market-driven) economy, the information collected for the legitimate purpose of making searches work is immensely valuable in the ad-wonk market. Anyone who has such information will probably be under immense pressure to sell it for other uses. Few of the search resources even bother to tell you whether, or how, their information is used for these "other purposes."

(I'll note that my current IE settings will not allow cookies from any site that doesn't have an online "privacy policy" conforming to a particular "standard," so the other engines I've used apparently do "have a policy" that one can search out if desired.)

I appreciate that Google is "up-front" about their tracking, and I'll admit that I did have to "examine my objections" before turning it on. I don't find what they say they are doing sufficiently objectionable to refuse to "be a statistic" for them; but they're likely to find me as a blip on the far end of their curve. Most of the sites they'll find me at are .orgs or tech sites that they don't usually include, except peripherally, in their indexes.

(My "page rank" bar shows the 'cat at about 48%. Maybe I ought to go hit a couple of porn sites just to tweak them?)

John