Yelp-led consortium wants third party sites included in top results.
Yesterday a new anti-Google consortium called “Focus on the User” launched a website that cleverly uses Google’s own words and algorithm to make an argument against Google+ Local (map pack) search results. It also operates as a concrete proposal that might substitute for the now defunct “rival links” compromise in the Google-EU antitrust matter.
One of the potential flaws of the approach is that it’s only geared toward “local intent” searches, which the site asserts represent “over a third” of all Google desktop searches (Google’s 2010 official figure was 20 percent). It takes aim at Google’s total discretion over the content of the “one box” or “answer box.”
Focus on the User is a consortium that features Yelp, TripAdvisor, Consumer Watchdog and other European based entities. It joins a number of other lobbying groups in Europe trying to impose restrictions on Google’s unfettered discretion over its search results.
The new website presents a video that makes the argument that Google+ is “hurting the Internet” and forcefully asserts that “Europeans have the power to stop it.” It seizes upon Google’s own statement that it’s operating in the “best interests of the user” and flips it on its head.
Source: Search Engine Land
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