It’s quite possible that you’ve used the site without noticing, but today Google is making a few tweaks in its wildly popular search engine. The new-look engine — which Google refers to as its “Universal Search” system — will bring the site closer to its goal of seamlessly aggregating search results from various different stripes of Web media.
That’s kind of a mouthful, but fortunately Search Engine Land has put together a thorough and lucid rundown of Universal Search. Basically, Universal Search will take Google’s specialized search services — which let users scan the Web for blogs, books, images, maps, videos, and so on — and blend them into unified search-results pages.
Will Web surfers warm to Universal Search? Only time will tell, but plenty of tech pundits have already weighed in on the service.
Ars Technica gives the revamped search engine a cautious thumbs-up: “Although the newly added features are somewhat useful, they don’t initially look that impressive, but perhaps the lack of impressiveness is part of the magic,” writes Ryan Paul, noting that Universal Search “provides access to a broader variety of results without adding complexity.”
But visitors hoping for a completely coherent search experience might be let down, according to Harry McCracken of PC World: “Google Web Results With Some Other Stuff Sprinkled Here and There” might have been a more accurate name for GUS as it stands, and one that would be less likely to result in disappointment.
Google has said, though, that Universal Search is still a work in progress. —Brock Read
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