Google to stop indexing pages with forms

In a move that will be hard for many to fathom, Google has decided to stop adding pages to its mammoth index which contain HTML forms. While industry experts believe that Google’s move is motivated by the fact that the search giant is frustrated because it’s having too tough a time filling out those forms, the Google Search Engineering Team gives a different response:

Our index is just growing much too fast. We can’t keep up with the exponential growth of the Web especially, these days, twitter. We don’t think people much care what’s behind forms but they do care what their friends had for breakfast. So, we have a solid business case for pruning content from our index that has marginal value.

Search engine experts predict that Google’s bold pruning move will cut the size of its index by roughly 43.5982%, give or take 20%.

Federated search industry experts don’t buy Google’s explanation for hatcheting forms. In what may seem to some as conspiracy theory, one federated search expert believed that Google was just being spiteful because it couldn’t index content behind forms. Under the condition that his identity would be concealed, federated search pundit Abe Lederman agreed to be interviewed for this article. Here’s the anonymous interview:

FS BLog: Mr. Lederman, do you really think that Google is being spiteful?

Abe Lederman: Yes. It’s tough to fill out all those forms. Google is learning that the hard way and it doesn’t like it.

FS Blog: What’s so hard about filling out those forms? My poodle can do it.

Abe Lederman: Well, poodles in general are very smart dogs and your poodle probably went to Stanford. Your average dog can’t fill out forms. It’s just too hard. That’s why there’s a whole industry dedicated to this stuff.

FS Blog: Is that why there are federated search engines (aka metasearch engines), like dogpile, for those of us who have a hard time filling out forms?

Abe Lederman: Sort of. With federated search you only have to fill out the form correctly once; the federated search engine then goes and fills out dozens of forms for you.

FS Blog: Thank you for your time.
Abe Lederman: Thank you, Mr. Blog.

Federated search users are relieved. Google won’t be taking over the federated search industry anytime soon, as was feared last year when Google announced it was aiming to federate the Web because crawling it was too tough. And, the public is happy as well since they’ll be able to get those breakfast menu updates from Google and not ever have to go to their twitter pages.

Happy April Fools’ Day, everyone!

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Tags: federated search