I was #5 last month, but as of today I rule the Google universe!
Not that I expect anyone to search for my weblog using my first name, but it's still pretty cool while it lasts...
UPDATE: I just found out I'm also the #1 hit for "MemoryStream", beating out the MSDN docs for this class - a clear example of how blogs can poison search results.
The only really good use for it I've found is when I'm setting up Firebird for someone - Fb does an "I'm Feeling Lucky" search if you just throw keywords into the address bar, so I show them how smart it is: just type phil in the addressbar and it knows where to go.
Although, as much trouble as I have remembering that there's no r in your last name, it could actually be a useful search result for at least one Google user...
Posted by Phil Ringnalda at August 6, 2003 1:59 AMThere's no way I'd ever come out #1...darn stupid name...:)
Posted by Chris Frazier at August 6, 2003 3:06 AMPhil: is that a FB setting somewhere? I just tried it and it got converted to http://luke/
Posted by Luke Hutteman at August 6, 2003 9:14 AMNumber one
Luke Hutteman reports that he's currently the number one hit on <a href="http://www.google.com/search?
Well, that's no fun. It works for me with a fresh install, so I'm not sure why it won't for you. Maybe something connection/proxy related? It does claim to be "resolving host luke" before it goes to Google. The only possibly-related pref I know of is browser.fixup.alternate.enabled (about:config, double-click, change to false), though that doesn't seem to have any effect either way for me.
Posted by Phil Ringnalda at August 6, 2003 11:01 AMPhil: looks like it was a proxy thing - I just tried it again on a different system that's not behind a proxy and here FB does behave like you described...
You're right - being #1 on google is actually kinda useful this way :-)
Posted by Luke Hutteman at August 6, 2003 10:47 PMCool, congrats on #1!
I am not #1 for Scott, but if you search on "Scott Mitchell" I'm #1, #2, and #6! :-)
Posted by Scott Mitchell at August 7, 2003 2:10 PMWoo-hoo! I just made #1 too!
Now to mail everyone I know with the "I'm feeling lucky" trick ;-)
Posted by Danny at August 9, 2003 8:00 AMThe MemoryStream thing isn't actually a bad result for everyone: remember, I can't spell your last name, so I've actually used that a couple of times to find you when I'm away from bookmarks and SharpReader.
But what I usually do is just add another keyword. If I want information about PHP's fopen, I search for "php fopen" and if I want C's fopen, I search for "c fopen". So for .Net, you just need to get a big stick and use it to beat some sense into whoever named the language after a TLD and made it virtually unsearchable. Er, I mean, search for "memorystream class" - they seem to do pretty well if you add "class" or "enumerator". Or if you really want MSDN results, "inurl:msdn".
Whether it's just the result of the index getting huge, or something specific to the way Google works these days, it seems like most of the "Google's broken" examples I see are a single word, and adding one more word vastly improves the quality of the results. I don't know why, but it seems to work pretty well: "aggregator" - not so good; "rss aggregator" - much better.
Posted by Phil Ringnalda at August 10, 2003 2:15 AMYou may have used MemoryStream to find my weblog, but I'm sure most people searching for MemoryStream are searching for the class, not my blog. Of course they can still see it at #3, but it does break the "feeling lucky"...
Posted by Luke Hutteman at August 10, 2003 9:05 AMIs the Atom/Echo/etc process backwards?
How do I add feeds to your software?. I'd like to add NPR and a medical news feed, as well as Infoworld.
Posted by francine hardaway at August 18, 2003 10:13 AMHow do I add feeds to your software?. I'd like to add NPR and a medical news feed, as well as Infoworld.
Posted by francine hardaway at August 18, 2003 10:13 AMHey, I rule the snot universe: Type in 'steve' and 'booger' and I'm #3!
Luke: 'member me? :)
Posted by Steve Magruder at August 20, 2003 9:01 PMAh yes - Steve "boogerman" Magruder - how could I forget? ;-)
Seriously though... why would anyone in their right mind do a vanity search like that????
Posted by Luke Hutteman at August 21, 2003 10:57 PMWhat do you mean, "poison"? It just means that bloggers are making a lot of noise on the web than the apostle or that guy in the movie.
Yeah, yeah, I'm sure more people have heard those other Lukes than have heard of you. But do either of them have a single web site with a lot of links to it? It's the web that's skewed, not Google.
Posted by Isaac Rabinovitch at September 2, 2003 2:07 AM