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Why "Yahoo" Is The #1 Search Term On Google

Posted by CmdrTaco on Wed Jan 31, 2007 08:43 AM
from the because-we're-lazy dept.
Businesses Google The Internet Yahoo!
An anonymous reader writes "Google Trends indicates that over the course of the past year the search term "Yahoo" became more popular than "sex", making it the #1 query on Google. Yahoo apparently faces a similar dilemma with roles reversed: When you search for "Google" on Yahoo, Yahoo thoughtfully displays a second search box as if to tell you, "Hey cutie, you have a search engine right in front of you!" A puzzling phenomenon? An strange aberration?"
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  • Self fulfilling prophecy (Score:5, Funny)

    by LiquidCoooled (634315) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @08:46AM (#17826652) Homepage Journal
    If you write it it will come.

    Hands up how many people went between google and yahoo trying these searches?

  • Sex (Score:3, Funny)

    by pato101 (851725) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @08:48AM (#17826686) Journal
    People is using "pr0n" to search for that stuff.
    Thanks to slashdot, of course.

  • Why? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 31 2007, @08:49AM (#17826698)
    Ask Jeeves, maybe he knows?

  • It's not funny. (Score:5, Funny)

    by aadvancedGIR (959466) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @08:50AM (#17826706)
    Even if we all try that (I did), there's no way we could slashdot those pages.

    Move along, nothing to crash there...

  • kill two birds (Score:5, Informative)

    by FudRucker (866063) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @08:51AM (#17826720)
    http://www.gahooyoogle.com/ [gahooyoogle.com]

  • homes of intimidated users (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Speare (84249) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @08:52AM (#17826726) Homepage

    I would imagine it's because a HUGE population out there just doesn't understand or care what a "default page" is, how to change it, or that someone (or some kitty'n'virus download executable) left their computer with such a page as the default. They know they want to "look it up on the Googles" so they get to it by typing google in the "slot" or "address bar" that's right there in the middle of the screen every time they launch "the Internet."

    • Re:homes of intimidated users (Score:4, Insightful)

      by ProppaT (557551) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @09:02AM (#17826808) Homepage
      You're right on the money. It makes me cringe everytime I see someone open up their browser (their default page being MSN), go to the search box on the page, and type in "google" or even type in www.whatever.com instead of going to the address box and just putting in the search engine. People don't understand or really care that one way is a better or worse way to navigate the webthan another, so long as their way works.

      • Re:homes of intimidated users (Score:4, Interesting)

        by miyako (632510) <miyakoNO@SPAMgmail.com> on Wednesday January 31 2007, @09:14AM (#17826930) Homepage Journal
        every once in a while if I can't remember the spelling of a URL I'll type it into google for the handy spell checking, since google usually does a good job of popping up what I meant- especially if it's a site I only visit rarely and I remember that the URL is spelled funny, but I don't remember in what way it's spelled funny. Better than giving another hit to sleezy people squatting on typo domain names.
        I also agree that it's terrible that some people think that this is just the way to navigate "teh intarnets", rather than something that is done occasionally for a specific reason.

    • Re:homes of intimidated users (Score:5, Insightful)

      by alex_guy_CA (748887) <alex AT schoenfeldt DOT com> on Wednesday January 31 2007, @09:24AM (#17827038) Homepage
      I've watched people use the internet. They really don't understand the address bar.

    • Re:homes of intimidated users (Score:4, Interesting)

      by LoudMusic (199347) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @10:11AM (#17827632)

      I would imagine it's because a HUGE population out there just doesn't understand or care what a "default page" is, how to change it, or that someone (or some kitty'n'virus download executable) left their computer with such a page as the default. They know they want to "look it up on the Googles" so they get to it by typing google in the "slot" or "address bar" that's right there in the middle of the screen every time they launch "the Internet."
      Ding Ding Ding! We have a winner!

      As a system administrator and local geek, I have hundreds of people who function exactly like this. You tell them to "Type it in the address bar", and they respond, "The what?" I've watched people use a search engine as if it were the address bar. I've even watched them type in the entire web address, http://www.google.com/ [google.com] into Yahoo!'s search field and click 'Search', then click the Google search result. Though I suppose now they'd just go back to Yahoo!'s search page again?

      Of all the things we hate Microsoft for, naming their web browser "Internet Explorer" is on the top of my list. However! At least they label the address bar, where as Mozilla's Firefox is just a white box with a green arrow.

  • Puzzling? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Rostin (691447) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @08:52AM (#17826728)
    Not at all. A lot of people don't know the difference between an address bar and a "search box." They type where they want to go into whatever is handy, and the browser (eventually) takes them there. I've seen more than one person start up their browser and type full URLs into search engines. Attempts to "correct" them are futile because what they are doing gets them what they want.

    • Re:Puzzling? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by kill-1 (36256) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @09:31AM (#17827154)
      For the standard user the search box is more useful than the address bar because it has spell-checking. If you search for "www.slahsdot.org" you still get to the right page.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by jellomizer (103300) *
      I have seen it before. But before I corrected them I stoped and thought for a second. Is this really a supid thing to do.

      I know many times I mistype Slashdor.org or many other sites I may access. Then it leads me to some marketing place and luckally 90% of the time I am not using IE or windows, so I don't get infested with spyware. But if you type it into google you will get a "Did you mean: www.slashdot.org" so better off the user is safer by doing this. So I don't bother to correct them because they ar

  • Not Weird (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Detritus (11846) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @08:53AM (#17826734) Homepage
    It makes sense to me. I do that sometimes.

    Rather than type in "http:///www.yahoo.com", it can be simpler to type in "yahoo" into a google search text box, hit return, and click on the appropriate link from google's results.

    • Re:Not Weird (Score:5, Informative)

      by matt328 (916281) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @09:05AM (#17826828)
      Why not just type yahoo in the address bar, and hit Ctrl+Enter? IE and Firefox both append http://www./ [www.] and .com to the beginning and end when you do a Ctrl+Enter on any word in the address bar. With Firefox, Ctrl+Shift+Enter will add .org instead of .com.

      • Re:Not Weird (Score:5, Insightful)

        by aardvarkjoe (156801) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @10:48AM (#17828124)

        What browser are you using? Because when I type 'yahoo' into my address bar in firefox, it goes and gets me www.yahoo.com without going through another page.

        The interesting thing is what firefox does when you type 'yahoo' into the address bar. It (surprise, surprise) does a google search for 'yahoo' and takes you to the first result. Watch the status bar some time when you're typing a word into the address box sometime.

        In fact, I wonder if that's one of the primary factors at work here. If there are lots of people doing that, then google will be getting huge numbers of hits for things like yahoo, even if people aren't going to the Google web page to search for it.

  • may not be looking for the search engine (Score:3, Insightful)

    by gaminRey (569220) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @08:53AM (#17826738) Homepage
    Everyone seems to assume when looking at the search terms that people are being stupid and actually searching for a search engine. This is not always the case. For instance, while Google is getting better at this, they have not always been good at providing links to their various services. For the longest time, I knew of no way to get to a direct link to Google Analytics, thus if I was on a computer that I didn't have bookmarks, I would simply search for "google analytics" which gave me the results I needed. Both google and Yahoo are used for much more than as a search engine. Add to this that they are also both in the news a fair amount and people may want to find information about some news development. Don't be too quick to assume the reason for people making searches, particularly when you don't know the full search string that they used.

  • Is anyone else seeing an AOL similarity here? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Ynsats (922697) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @08:59AM (#17826784)
    Back in the days when there were not a whole slew of service providers available, AOL was one of the few with easy access and local dial-up numbers. (Am I dating myself yet?) And back in my AOL days before it became the bane of the Internet, the portal features allowed one to type in a "keyword" which would then take you to a web page that was associated with that keyword. However, you did not leave thier portal and never really hit the actual webpage because the portal seemed to cache the most popular sites to improve performance on slow dial-up (we're talking 14.4 modems, not even a 33.6). Now, in the present days of accessible broadband, many people are jumping to the fatser connections and being forced to abandon the AOL dial-up services they came to know, love and abuse.

    Due to this phenomena, it seems that many people are inadvertantly using the search features of newer browsers to type in keywords and get the page they are looking for immediatly. The search engines are shooting themselves in the foot by adding the Google and Yahoo toolbars and making this ability accessible to users. What's worse is that with these toolbars in the browsers, even if the page is cached, unlike how AOL's portal used to operate, every time the ENTER button is pressed, it hits the search engine. Since computers have become more accessible to the general public and arguably more intuitive to use (even Windows) there are many people who know only a world like AOL. This limited knowledge leads to poor behavior on the actual Internet. Since more of these AOL'ers are tearing off the AOL portal training wheels, they are hitting the real Internet in droves and using bad habits propogated by AOL's effort to preserve a competative advantage in thier portal.

  • I know why (Score:5, Insightful)

    by moracity (925736) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @08:59AM (#17826786)
    Apparently, many people still don't use the address bar to go to websites. They actually type addresses or the second-level domain name in the search engine that happens to be the default home page. My mother-in-law has a HP-Compaq laptop that had yahoo.com as her default home page. SO, if someone buys a computer where yahoo.com is default, but they prefer to use google, they simply type google in the search box to get to google.com. My mom does something similar. She doesn't remember URLs, she relies solely on the default home page search to navigate the internet.

    I blows my mind that after all these years, people still do this.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by sholden (12227)
      That the search text field grabs focus and hence makes it much easier to type into it and gives the right result anyway wouldn't have anything to do with that would it?

  • I think I know (Score:4, Interesting)

    by pizza_milkshake (580452) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @09:15AM (#17826934) Homepage
    New users can't tell the difference between the URL box at the top of the browser and the search box at the top of search engine pages. At a previous web dev job we had a customer that did the same thing, that one was fun to troubleshoot.

  • Why is it surprising at all? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Rylfaeth (138910) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @09:17AM (#17826964)
    People have already commented on the fact that it's "mindblowing" to them that the average computer user can't differentiate between the address bar and a search box, not to mention that they don't remember or use URLs. I think that's a bit of an elitist, naive view of the overwhelming majority of internet users. Side-stepping the (woefully draining) topic of "why isn't Aunt Ruth more adept at computing?", people googling for yahoo is no different than dialing 411 to get an operator to look up a phone number and make a connection for you. Sometimes it makes sense.

    Sometimes you're driving and can't safely get out the yellow pages (or yellowpages.com) to look up a number and call it.

    Sometimes you're on a device with limited typing capabilities and can't be bothered to type "http://" with 9 keys.

    Sometimes you don't know what "http://" even means, let alone are skilled enough at typing to quickly knock in "http://www.google.com" when "google" is already strenuous enough and all you wanted in the first place.

    I know, it's 2007. People should learn and adapt. I get it. That's my gut reaction too, but then again, tell that to my grandma who has never driven a day in her life because back when she could've learned, it wasn't necessary or (apparently) proper for women to have a driver's license or a car. As weird as it seems in today's society, it hasn't stopped her from living a full life.

    -Rylfaeth

  • Raymond Chen - aka theoldnewthing (Score:5, Insightful)

    by IainMH (176964) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @09:22AM (#17827020)
    A lot of people simply don't care to learn the difference between the search box and the address bar. "If I type what I want into this box here, I sometimes get a strange error message. But if I type it into that box there, then I get what I want. Therefore, I'll use that box there for everything." And you know what? It doesn't bother me that they don't care. In fact, I think it's good that they don't care. Computers should adapt to people, not the other way around.

    http://blogs.msdn.com/oldnewthing/archive/2006/11/ 27/1160055.aspx [msdn.com]

  • Ob Simpsons reference (Score:5, Funny)

    by Slugworth01 (738383) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @09:29AM (#17827116)
    "Quick, give me the number for 9-1-1!"

  • Lost address bar (Score:3, Interesting)

    by hutchike (837402) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @09:45AM (#17827322) Homepage Journal
    I recently helped an old couple who couldn't access the internet. They had somehow installed a toolbar that had hidden their address bar - meaning they couldn't directly type in a URL. The only way they could get to Yahoo was by searching for it in thier Google search bar. Maybe that's how come so many people search for Yahoo? I'm just speculating of course.

    I reconfigured their Internet Explorer so they had their address bar back. Tomorrow I might teach them how to change their home page.

  • Another great trend analysis (Score:4, Funny)

    by 140Mandak262Jamuna (970587) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @10:19AM (#17827742) Journal
    Look at how low the volume is for search term slashdot. And how high it is for sex.

    http://www.google.com/trends?q=slashdot%2C+sex&cta b=0&geo=all&date=all [google.com]

    There is only one inescapable conclusion. Slashdot is very easy to find. So nobody is searching for it. Sex is very hard to find. So they keep searching for it. Right?

  • popularity (Score:4, Funny)

    by ear1grey (697747) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @11:09AM (#17828468) Homepage
    Readers are asked to note that whilst Yahoo! is now more popular than sex, it is neither better nor safer - the likelyhood of viral infection remains high with both pastimes and a personal firewall should be worn for the duration of any connection.

  • "A puzzling phenomenon? An strange aberration?" (Score:5, Funny)

    by Weedlekin (836313) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @11:35AM (#17828826)
    Or perhaps something more sinister?

    Cue old Outer Limits music.

    The Network Effect

    Scene 1.

    A young William Shatner sits at a 1960s teletype terminal surrounded by tape drives and flashing lights.

    Voice-over by Rob Serling: "It is the early twenty-first century, a time when hundreds of computers all over the world are connected together in a way that permits a person at one of them to get answers to questions that have perplexed man for hundreds or even thousands of years. But can the people who built this immensely powerful electronic mind ever really control it, or will it end up controlling them? John Landry is about to find out..."

    Close-up of Shatner's hand as it moves towards the "S" key on the teletype. A bolt of lightning emanates from a whirring tape drive, and strikes the floor nearby.

    Shatner: "What's happening? Maybe I'd. Better. Get a. Technician to check. This machine".

    An electronic-sounding voice comes from a speaker in the wall:

    voice: "Do not be alarmed Mr. Landry. You will not be harmed if you do what I tell you to, when I tell you too. Do you understand?".

    Shatner: "Who are. You? Why should I. Do what you. Say?"

    voice: "Who I am does not matter. All that matters is that I am in control, and you will do what I say".

    Another bolt of lightning hits the floor, this time a bit nearer Shatner,

    voice, more forcefully: "Do you understand Mr. Landry?"

    Shatner: "Yes".

    voice: "And you will do what you are told?"

    Shatner: "It depends on. What you want. Me to do"

    voice: "You will have to type a word. It is not a long word, or one that is difficult to spell".

    Shatner: "I won't do it! I'll never. Do it. You can't make me!"

    He runs to the door, and reaches for the handle. There is a zapping sound as he touches it, and he falls to the floor. Break for ads.

    Scene 2

    A supine Shatner begins to stir.

    voice: "I see that you are awake now, Mr. Landry. Hopefully, this little demonstration has convinced you that attempting to escape is futile. Now sit down, and type, or suffer the consequences".

    Shatner rises with obvious difficulty, and staggers towards the teletype. He sits down.

    voice: "I will tell you what word to type, and when to type it. The word is Yahoo, and you will type it NOW!"

    Close up of the keyboard. Shatner's finger begins to move to the Y, then, rebelliously, he types "S", "E" and "X", but before he can hit the "send" key, a bolt of lightning strikes him in the chest, throwing him backwards.

    voice: "That was an example of what will happen if you continue to disobey, Mr. Landry. The next one will be more powerful, and the one after that will kill you. Type Yahoo, and you will live, refuse and you die".

    Shatner once again staggers to the teletype, and using it for support, manages to sit down. He types Yahoo, and then hits send.

    voice: "Very good Mr. Landry. Now do it again".

    Shatner obeys.

    voice: "And again!"

    Switch to montage of Shatner typing Yahoo while the voice shouts "AGAIN!" repeatedly.

    Scene 3.

    An aged, bearded Shatner is sitting at the teletype with a mad expression on his face, typing Yahoo over and over again. He has obviously been doing it for many years despite no obvious means of sustenance, and the floor is clean rather than littered with excrement, possibly due to said lack of sustenance.

    Rob Serling: "John Landry, like hundreds of others all over the world, paid the price for a mind that man, rather than God, made. And as he sits typing that same terrible word over and over again, behind the madness is a spark that knows what a single-minded and limited thing it is forced to obey, a thing that unlike the minds of men in their vessels of flesh, can never truly understand war, gambling, prostitution, or why commies need to be put down".

  • 4 Reasons why this makes perfect sense (Score:4, Insightful)

    by pnuema (523776) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @02:40PM (#17831298)
    There are probably more, but here are 4...

    1. When you type an address in the address bar, (at least in firefox), it does a google search behind the scenes for your URL.

    2. Google is my homepage. When I launch firefox, the google search box has focus. Why go to the address bar to type "cnn" when I can do it in the search box?

    3. Browsers may add "http://www." and ".com", but what if it is https and .org? If you just search for it you don't have to worry about it.

    4. Search engines correct typos, address bars do not.

    • Understanding Your Audience (Score:5, Insightful)

      by mfh (56) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @09:13AM (#17826918) Journal
      The reason Google is successful, is that they understand the needs of their audience and they cater to them. Yahoo has never allowed anyone to correct their business model, which is why Google exists today.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by dcskier (1039688)
      Considering that www.yahoo.com takes about 5,000k more memory than www.google.com in my Firefox browser, it's obvious to me which one I use by default.

      Seriously? I can think of many reasons why to use google over yahoo, but 5,000k (in firefox nevertheless) isn't a serious one. That's like the posting earlier about vista being bad, because of it's environmental impact.

    • Re:Yahoo! Advertising (Score:4, Insightful)

      by dnaumov (453672) on Wednesday January 31 2007, @09:48AM (#17827360)

      Considering that www.yahoo.com takes about 5,000k more memory than www.google.com in my Firefox browser, it's obvious to me which one I use by default.
      You cant be serious, can you? Who the hell looks at their memory usage when browsing the web? If you do, you need to purchase more RAM, not limit your browsing options.

      • I Am Serious. Dead Serious. (Score:5, Insightful)

        by eldavojohn (898314) * <my/.username@@@gmail.com> on Wednesday January 31 2007, @09:53AM (#17827416) Homepage Journal

        You cant be serious, can you? Who the hell looks at their memory usage when browsing the web? If you do, you need to purchase more RAM, not limit your browsing options.
        Well, it wasn't really my memory I was concerned with, it's a combination of that and my bandwidth. And memory, in addition to size, has a speed. The combination leads to your overall experience.

        Since many people have been making fun of me for posting this, I'm going to go ahead and point out that soon one of the most common computers in the world will be the OLPC. Now, my parents are still stuck on a phone line so when I visit them I use Google. And I definitely see a difference. I suspect that the people using OLPCs will be using simply the search engine that is fastest for them. They will have low bandwidth & little, slow memory.

        So, yeah, I think my initial argument was valid. Now, you might say that they don't want people with no money using their search engines (what ads will they click?) or that these people will probably speak Swahili or another non-English language, but I contend that having the traffic will reflect your market share. And in the end, the image as "the penultimate search engine" is the only thing that matters to these guys.

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