SEO: A problem of humanity
Why we can't find good content if we really know where to look
As of today, March 2025, we have been talking about the latest Google search algorithm updates and their effects on journalism. It has been more than a year* since Alphabet started trying to improve the experience of its most obvious product: Google Search.
* Actually, they have been doing that for years! It’s like a cat-and-mouse game between content creators and search engine companies.
Do you remember the last time you typed that website URL into the address bar? I honestly can’t!
If you are creating content on Tiktok, you’ve already accepted that it’s their platform—you’re essentially working within their ecosystem to gain attention and earn money. The same goes for Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, and so on.
But in the case of Google Search, Google is an especially interesting—and dangerous—monopoly over the most fundamental content of all: the internet itself.
You have to play by their rules just to get more clicks on your website.
Let’s dive into this story and try to understand what the future of the internet looks like.
The evolution of search
There was an era that we literally don’t have neither google nor any kind of search engines. The Internet was a chaotic space where finding information only relied on curated lists of websites.
Ok, let’s have a quick break here. Normally I read and summarized the history of search engines here. But then, I realized I have a personal rule to not increase the noise at internet. You can read that story from a lot of other sources, you can watch it at Youtube. So, If you came here to read this blog post I bet you came here to hear my ideas about this topic.
You can read Search Engine article at Wikipedia to learn more about
Basically, Google didn’t invent the search engine. Before Google, there were companies like AltaVista that attempted to index the internet using primitive methods, mostly ranking results based on basic keyword matching, without any real semantic understanding.
Page Rank Algorithm
In 1998, Google literally changed the game with its PageRank algorithm. I would easily choose that moment as one of the most important events in technology history. As an engineer, I love seeing history from a technological advancement perspective, and this was truly a game-changer.
The basic idea of PageRank algorithm was rank web pages based on both number and quality of links pointing to them. By using backlinks as a proxy for credibility, Google provided us a much better search experience.
You can again read more about it via it’s Wikipedia page
New player joined the game: Google Inc.
As you might expect from two young entrepreneurs, they eventually found a way to secure investment and turn their technology into a profitable business. It is funny that you can search google investment history via Crunchbase1. They got 25M$ investment after a year (after 2 pre-seed investment), and with that investment they started to look for revenue model.
At first, they explored different ways to monetize their technology, such as:
- Licensing their search technology to other websites.
- Selling a hardware product that would let companies search their own internal files
But If you read original research paper about search engine, there was something very clear that they were not fan of advertising model. Here is direct quote from the article2:
Currently, the predominant business model for commercial search engines is advertising. The goals of the advertising business model do not always correspond to providing quality search to users.
…
we expect that advertising funded search engines will be inherently biased towards the advertisers and away from the needs of the consumers.
Since it is very difficult even for experts to evaluate search engines, search engine bias is particularly insidious
…
it could be argued from the consumer point of view that the better the search engine is, the fewer advertisements will be needed for the consumer to find what they want.
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However, there will always be money from advertisers who want a customer to switch products, or have something that is genuinely new. But we believe the issue of advertising causes enough mixed incentives that it is crucial to have a competitive search engine that is transparent and in the academic realm.
That was harsh! It almost feels like a plot twist from the Netflix series Dark. “Ich bin du!”
Anyway, I can’t blame anyone for wanting to make more money. I am probably too naive to believe that Google kept their David spirit for long, and eventually they became Goliath.
Of course they choose advertising as their business model. If you are interested in the full story, I am putting a podcst reference: Is Google Getting Worse? (Update) from Freakonomics
Year after year, these advancement led to rise of a new concept: Search Engine Optimization (SEO).
No! Oh no. There were SEO attempts even before Google! So, it was all us (content creators) who tries to get more clicks.
It is believed that in 1997 John Audette on a meeting with Danny Sullivan for the first time used the term “Search Engine Optimization”. You can read more via links.
That is good part of writing blog post for me. I am also learning and organizing my thoughts..
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
SEO basically means finding the right keywords, getting good backlinks, and making a profit from it. But it was actually a battle between content creators and search engine companies.
To be fair, Google never intended to promote SEO-optimized pages. It was us hacking their system, trying to win the attention economy game. But again, to be fair to content creators: Google was the one who set the rules of the game—we just learned how to play by them.
Google by its nature, just probably wants us to use search engine more and more and click relevant advertisement If we need.
There’s a long history behind this SEO war, but the basic idea is this: Every time Google develops a new solution to show better content, content creators fight back. And to fight back, you generally need a lot of time and money. And over the years, this game has tilted in favor of big media companies and wealthy publishers, dominating search results while small, independent creators struggle to get noticed.
The latest fight between content creators and Google has had some casualties—one of them being independent journalism…
Interesting fact I learned that Google is indexing approximately 5% of the whole internet. Private posts on social media, low quality spam contents, dark web they are all out of Google.
That’s probably why finding a meme on Instagram is so frustrating. Their terrible search functionality forces me to manually index my own meme collection—by sending the best ones to a couple of friends so I can find them later. (Try it yourself—describing a meme and searching for it on Instagram is nearly impossible.)
Okay, that was just my hyperactive brain going off-topic. Let’s get back on track.
I originally wrote a section full of mind-blowing stats about Google’s monopoly, but then I deleted it—because, honestly, we all already know how dominant they are. Whether they’re a monopoly or part of an oligopoly depends on the market, but one thing is clear: Google is so powerful that there's even a term for it—"Google Tax."
It’s the cost of existing in the online world. If you want visibility, if you want traffic, you have to play by Google’s rules. And if they change the rules? Well, tough luck.
Humanity Problem: The Crisis of Independent Journalism
Journalism has long been considered the backbone of an informed society…
No, you don’t need me to remind you why journalism matters. I’ll skip that part.
But keep in mind that journalism and advertising always have been tied together. It was never enough to just sell newspaper, ads were always part of the business model. And within digital revolution and digital advertising era, they naturally just adapted. And, of course, as with every other attention-driven industry, bigger news agencies won again—dominating search rankings, social media feeds, and ad revenue.
My Problem: Research something
Let’s take this blog post as an example. I started writing it because I recently read The People vs Tech and listened a lot about Google Search Engine updates and I also learned a new term: Limitarianism.
But as I try to organize my thoughts into a structured blog format, I’m struggling to find nuanced perspectives or well-researched articles beyond Wikipedia and promotional content. The most visible sources tend to be mainstream media reports or corporate blogs, while critical insights and independent research are buried beneath algorithmic noise. Some of the best information isn’t even indexed at all—it lives in books, academic papers behind paywalls, or scattered across podcasts and newsletters.
Very good example of good content: Is Google Getting Worse? by Freakonomics Radio . As I already regular listener of them, I already knew I should use their website searchbar to learn more about a topic.
Try it yourself: search for a complex topic on Google today. If you’ve been online for a while, you’ll probably notice something—Google search isn’t what it used to be.
I am not sure If AI is the problem or the solution, but it is obvious that the way we interact with internet is changing.
But as I keep listening about this topic, I still believe google is still fairly best option in search engine market. But, google was surely something different a couple of years back. And, maybe we should question how we interact with knowledge!
Cleaner content away from Google’s eyes!
If Google’s indexing is at the root of this problem—the flood of SEO-driven, low-quality content—then maybe we should focus on the vast amount of valuable content that Google can’t index.
The Hidden Corners of Quality Content
Podcast
One major example is audio content, especially podcasts. By their nature, they are difficult to index and challenging to monetize with dynamic ads, making them feel like old-school radio—just with modern technology.
I actually have mixed feelings about the growing trend of podcast transcriptions. If you search for something on Apple Podcasts today, it often pulls results from transcripts rather than just episode titles. On one hand, this makes it easier to find key discussions. On the other, it signals a shift—one that might eventually make podcasts as searchable (and potentially as gamed) as the rest of the web.
Book
Another obvious example is books. The publishing industry still operates by the old rules, largely beyond the reach of search engines. In fact, a lawsuit between book publishers and Google in 2015 resulted in Google being restricted from fully indexing book contents.
But I would like to have indexed search functionality for books, actually :) The difference in content quality between books and blog posts often comes down to effort—anyone can publish a blog instantly, but writing a book and getting it published is a much higher barrier.
Then, maybe we should put a higher barrier to write something to internet world! It is free for me to write anything I want here..
Video
Then there’s video content—movies, documentaries, and YouTube. This one is tricky. If you are a YouTube addict like me, you probably tell yourself, I’ll just watch the latest videos from my favorite channels. But let’s be honest—that’s a lie. YouTube’s recommendation algorithm still dictates a huge part of what we watch.
When it comes to movies and documentaries, I find the selection process more organic. For me, it’s still mostly word of mouth—I need to hear about something on a podcast, read about it in a book, or get a recommendation from a friend.
Where to find the best content?
Speaking from experience—and trust me, I consume a lot of books, podcasts, and articles—when I want quality, I rely on:
- Subscriptions to trusted publications
- Podcasts I know and respect
- YouTube channels I follow
- Writers and bloggers I trust
- Books—the ultimate deep dive into any subject
But there is another new player in the game: Artificial Intelligence.
AI and the Future of Online Content
You probably know far better than me about this (AI) topic.
With all my respect to everyone, and believe me I am far beyond the normal respectful person level; I strongly believe we should react on AI generated garbage on internet. If you are talking with AI to learn something, that is something I can surely respect. You can also believe whatever AI says.
But to write another curated list of something, or telling a story of social media again by copying and pasting details to your post. I also did that time to time, but I think we should really react on that kind of content creation.
Last thoughts
So, I am going to question a couple of things:
What are incentives to create online content for people?
Journalism? If so, how was journalism looks like before?
Promote yourself or your company! I believe that kinf of contents is most problematic part. And I believe AI generated contents are mostly belongs here.
Blogging. Like me, trying to populate ideas and gaining intellectuality. Trying to reach more friends and have meaningful conversation about the topics I am interested. I think we should “sahiplenmek” that portion of online content.
And there is a line here, which you can’t say I am doing it for fun. If you have lot’s of patreon subscriber or paid substack I think you are doing either paid journalism or promoting yourself. But
And there has been always paywalls. But for the last couple of years, especially after chatGPT revolution, paywalls haing a comeback these days.
Are we happy to see ads or not?
Remember there were almost no such thing “free public content”. If you are having a thoughful conversation with your friends, it’s free. If you are going to public school, it is free. But any kind of content always has to be financially sustainable.
As a humanity, it seems we found a fairly good balance point of giving our usage data and seeing relevant advertisement (it is better than seeing irrelevant ads) to use those technologies for free.
Otherwise, we have to pay the fee of paywalls to any kind of content and service. Maybe, that would be more peaceful world! I actually did that for Youtube, because they forced us to become a premium user. And to be honest, YouTube is best thing happened on the internet era.
Who said we can search internet?
I mean, what kind of organization owns us that technology. If you are living in a city and trying to check public transportation, is it municipality service or we can just outsource it to Google? What about having a free navigation?
I think If we can jump to another parallel universe without advertisement, those are all governmental responsibilities. They should give it with our taxes. Now, within this world Google is giving all of them free with our “Google Taxes”
Then, is Google governing us?
Google is surely too big to fail. But can we say, they are stakeholder of governing whole world?
