Posted on 05/23/2014 10:09:30 AM PDT by Yossarian
Free Republic is a great resource to visit and browse, but it also is valuable to use as a searchable resource. It is very useful to see what FReepers have to say on various subjects, as we come from wide array of backgrounds, and have lived practical lives in the very-real world.
Hence, one of the ways I access FR is via Google's search engine. I do a search, but specify to ONLY get results from Free Republic by appending "site:freerepublic.com" to the search term(s). In the past, this would guide me to the pages hosted on freerepublic.com, full of FReeper commentary, and this would help inform me on various topics.
HOWEVER, this recently has changed. Now, when I perform the same kind of site-restricted search, the results I get from Google look the same as before, showing links that should take one to freerepublic.com. However, when one clicks on the link, it brings up FR's "redirect to an external website" mechanism. As a result, it takes me to the external web page of the article being discussed, rather than the Free Republic-hosted page full of FReeper commentary on the article.
The end effect is EXTREMELY maddening: it effectively silences FReeper commentary. So far, I only see this affecting freerepublic.com - corresponding checks on dailykos.com, or democraticunderground.com do NOT lead to unexpected forwarding to the external article that is the item of discussion.
Are other people seeing this problem? What is an effective fix (beyond using a different search engine)? Can JohnRob fix this?
Thanks much for your time,
Yossarian
old-timer
Perhaps Google = NSA.
As far as Left Wing google is concerned, I suspect so.
Very.
Article I posted two days ago on FR "From the ash heap of history" still shows up on Google (with that title in quotes); fifth entry down the page.
Don’t use Google for anything. I set Free Republic as my home page, and use Bing for other stuff. Google is bad, m’kay?
Google Advanced Search is working fine for me.
This search “(Vanity) Google search is no longer linking to Free Republic pages site:freerepublic.com” takes me right to this article. But you don’t have a linked article.
This search “A Vision that Hasn’t Aged Well site:freerepublic.com” takes me to the correct FR page, not the linked article at Townhall.com.
I had switched to Bing earlier this year. I find that only by using BOTH Bing and Google together can I do an effective search - both have holes.
Time to go back to Bing as primary, or try an “alternative” like dogpile.....
It was doing for me what it was doing for you when 'site:' was included, but when it's omitted it works fine.
That being said, Gargle is EVIL, and should only be used as a last resort.
And even then with ALL your AdBlock/Ghostery/etc shields deployed.
Which search engine do you use?
I have been trying to remember what I used to use. Hmmmm .... brain doesn’t want to co-operate.
Bing primarily, along with DuckDuckGo and Ixquick.
Duck is vey serious about privacy, even more so than Ixquick/Startpage.
But it's a daily temptation NOT to resort to Gargle,
as their UI strikes me as significantly less klunky than the others.
Thanks, I will try these; I don’t trust Google.
Years ago I used Dog Pile and a couple of others.
My point is, the googlebots are *NOT* crawling the web, they are parked right here at Free Republic waiting for input. They didn't "come across your post", they instantly captured it as you sent it to Free Republic.
The way it NORMALLY works is "Googlebots crawling the web come across your post." The fact is, they aren't crawling. One or more are actively focused on this website.
Thanks... And Google is going back on the “last resort” list...
(Courtesy ping to Jim re: FR pagerank, etc.)
No, you were clear.
There are no googlebots “parked” on FR. Google crawls FR so often for a number of reasons. Among those reasons are the popularity of the site (pages served, etc.), search optimization performed by FR’s webmaster (John), and your browsing habits.
Having current FR pages displayed high/first in the search results is a good thing. If Google stops returning FR pages, then you should worry. (i.e. FR is no longer popular or has been blacklisted.)
You mean like this search, for “gay marriage” on FR from 1/1/1999-1/1/2005?
I have noticed what you are talking about, for at least a week.
That thought occurred to me also, but when I tried it I found that I was still getting the redirector fairly often. When I append /focus to the site designation it never seems to give me redirector links. My most recent experiment was with the search term “Declares”
Declares +site:freerepublic.com/focus
(no redirector links on first page of results)
Declares +site:freerepublic.com -redirected
(plenty of redirector results)
You are quibbling over my choice of terms. Anything which can grab your commentary withing seconds or minutes might just as well be parked here.
Among those reasons are the popularity of the site (pages served, etc.), search optimization performed by FR’s webmaster (John), and your browsing habits.
So you tell me that you could go to any popular website, say "Huffington post", and make a comment, and within a minute google would return it as a search link back to the web page you commented on?
I would like to see this experiment tried, but I cannot bring myself to post at a liberal site.
You could be right. I haven’t tried dogpile or any of the other alternative search engines; Bing seems to do OK for me. I just loathe Google, is all.
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