RSSStore Is Closed
With Google’s autocomplete feature, search suggestions are offered as you type a search string. Frequently, I am surprised and distracted by the suggestions; I find myself exploring people’s strange and interesting search queries. The following 5 autocomplete suggestions are like self contained short stories of love, betrayal, and madness.
How Do I K…
This first autocomplete list started my curiosity. It is essentially an algorithmic short story about love and betrayal. ‘How do I know if he likes me, if he’s the one.’ Obviously, she/he really likes him. However, what’s the consequence, now she/he might have a cavity because of a romantic dessert, and worse, she might be pregnant and she/he might have AIDS. This makes me think that Google autocomplete doesn’t give good answers regarding how to know if he’s the one.
How Do you Know If…
Again, we come to the timeless story of love and betrayal. ‘How do you know if a guy/girl likes you?’ ‘How do you know if you are in love?’ Seemingly harmless and innocent questions.Yet, in the same suggestion list we have questions of strep throat and pregnancy. It looks like She/he failed to tell him/her about having strep throat before they played tongue hockey, and worse yet, now she doesn’t know if she is pregnant!
Why Does…
If Jack Nicholson were searching on Google in The Shining, these are all questions he would have asked. Here we have multiple questions about ice and snow: ‘why does ice float,’ ‘why does salt melt ice,’ and ‘why does it snow.’ Obviously, this is the onset of cabin fever. This person is trapped inside his/her house, and naturally asks about what he/she sees most, ice and snow.
Then we see the onset of anxiety and hypersensitivity to sound. ‘Why does my cat lick plastic bags?’ ‘Why does my eye twitch?’ At this point, cabin fever is fully developed, and any annoying sound like a cat licking a plastic bag will set him/her off.
If there were room for one more search string on the suggestion list, it would probably be, ‘why does all work and no play make Jack a dull boy?’
Choose Between…
This is the Zen of Google Algorithm. We explore the two most common questions ‘choose between two guys,’ and ‘choose between two movies.’ Yet we have the answer in the form of another question: ‘choose between what is right and what is easy,’ and again: ‘choose between what is easy and what is right.’
Autocomplete gives us a suggestion on choosing between guys and movies. What is the easy guy/movie, and what is the right guy/movie?
How to Secretly…
In case you didn’t believe in reefer madness, autocomplete wanted to remind you. The downfall begins at ‘how to secretly grow weed outdoors.’ We have someone at the beginning stages of reefer madness. Now that he/she has an uninterrupted supply, he/she turns his/her mind on ‘how to secretly date.’
However, he/she wonders if his/her partner is not secretly dating too, so they learn ‘how to secretly track iphone.’ What he/she discovers causes him/her to learn ‘how to secretly get revenge’ and ‘how to secretly ruin someone’s life. I think the lesson is clear, stay off the weed…
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