By Gerrit De Vynck

杰里特·德温克(Gerrit De Vynck)

Type a query into the Google search bar on a smartphone and there’s a good chance the results will be dominated by advertising.

在智能手机上的Google搜索栏中键入查询，很有可能结果将以广告为主。

That stems from a decision in 2015 to test a fourth ad, rather than three, at the top of search results. Some employees opposed the move at the time, saying it could reduce the quality of Google’s responses, according to people familiar with the deliberations. But the company brushed aside those concerns because it was under pressure to meet Wall Street growth expectations, one of the people said.

这是因为2015年决定在搜索结果的顶部测试第四个广告，而不是三个广告。 知情人士说，当时一些员工反对这一举动，称此举可能降低谷歌回应的质量。 一位知情人士说，但该公司避免了这些担忧，因为它面临着达到华尔街增长预期的压力。

By 2016, the extra marketing slot was a regular feature. It’s one of the many ways the search leader has altered how it presents results since its early days. Another example is the pre-packaged information Google often displays in a box at the top of a page, rather than sending users to other websites. Phased in gradually over years, changes like these have gone largely unnoticed by legions of consumers who regularly turn to Google to call up information and hunt for bargains. The company says these changes support its mission to organize the world’s information and make it useful and accessible to everyone.

到2016年，额外的营销机会已成为常规功能 。 这是搜索领导者自成立以来改变其呈现结果的多种方式之一。 另一个示例是Google经常在页面顶部的框中显示预先包装的信息，而不是将用户发送到其他网站。 经过数年的逐步发展，此类变化在很大程度上没有引起众多消费者的注意，这些消费者定期求助于Google来获取信息并寻找便宜货。 该公司表示，这些变化支持其组织世界信息并使所有人都可以使用和访问的使命。

But to many web publishers and other businesses that have historically relied on the internet giant to send users to their sites, Google’s subtle tweaks have siphoned off vital traffic and made it harder — and costlier — to reach customers online.

但是，对于许多历史上一直依赖互联网巨头将用户发送到其网站的网络发行商和其他企业而言，谷歌的微妙调整已经扼杀了重要流量，并使其更难(且成本更高)地在线吸引客户。

Debate over Google’s influence is gathering intensity as U.S. regulators prepare an antitrust case against the company in what will be one of the biggest legal clashes between the government and a corporation since the U.S. sued Microsoft Corp. in 1998. Google controls about 85% of the U.S. search market, and the changes it’s made have piled pressure on businesses to pay more to appear at the top of search results. That’s already a focus of regulators. Last year, David Cicilline, head of the House Subcommittee on Antitrust, asked Google if a 2004 statement from co-founder Larry Page that the company wants to get users “out of Google and to the right place as fast as possible,” still described its approach. In a written response, Google simply skipped the question.

自从美国1998年起诉微软以来，这是政府与企业之间最大的法律冲突之一，有关美国政府准备针对该公司提起的反托拉斯诉讼，有关Google的影响力的辩论正在日益激烈。Google控制着该公司约85％的股份。美国搜索市场及其所带来的变化给企业施加了更大的压力，他们要求他们支付更多费用以使其出现在搜索结果的顶部。 这已经是监管机构关注的重点。 去年，众议院反托拉斯小组委员会负责人戴维·西西里(David Cicilline)询问谷歌，联合创始人拉里·佩奇(Larry Page)在2004年发表的声明中说，谷歌是否希望让用户“尽快离开Goog​​le并到达正确的位置”，它的方法。 在书面答复中，Google只是跳过了这个问题。

The government is wading into a complex business with many competing interests that Google must balance. Users want the best answers. Web developers need eyeballs. Shareholders demand growth. From the beginning, websites have tried to trick Google’s algorithm into feeding them traffic, and they complain when the company cracks down. However, some web developers and advertisers say this balance has swung too far in Google’s favor.

政府正在介入一项复杂的业务，它与谷歌必须平衡许多竞争利益。 用户想要最好的答案。 Web开发人员需要关注。 股东需求增长。 从一开始，网站就试图欺骗Google的算法来为其提供流量，并且当公司倒闭时他们抱怨。 但是，一些网络开发人员和广告商表示，这种平衡已经大大偏离了Google的支持范围。

In the early 2000s, the company’s search engine offered a simple deal: Produce quality information and Google will send you traffic so you can make money showing ads. Reinvest some of that cash to make better experiences, and the web will grow, giving Google more territory to explore and organize.

在2000年代初期，该公司的搜索引擎提供了一个简单的协议：产生高质量的信息，而Google会为您带来点击量，这样您就可以通过展示广告获利。 重新投资其中一些现金以获得更好的体验，网络将不断发展，从而为Google提供了更多的探索和组织领域。

“Our search results are the best we know how to produce. They are unbiased and objective,” Page and co-founder Sergey Brin wrote when the company went public in 2004. Ads would be few, helpful and unobtrusive, they said.

“我们的搜索结果是我们知道如何产生的最好结果。 它们是公正而客观的。”佩奇和联合创始人谢尔盖·布林(Sergey Brin)在2004年该公司上市时写道。广告说的很少，有用和不引人注目。

This deal has been slowly changing, though. A turning point came in June 2019. That was when more than half of searches kept users on Google for the first time, rather than sending people to other sites through a free web link or an ad, according to data from digital marketing company Jumpshot.

不过，这笔交易一直在缓慢变化。 一个转折点出现在2019年6月。当时，数字营销公司Jumpshot的数据显示，超过一半的搜索首次使用户保留在Google上，而不是通过免费的网络链接或广告将人们吸引到其他站点。

“We’ve passed a milestone in Google’s evolution from search engine to walled-garden,” said Rand Fishkin, who has advised businesses on how to work with Google’s search engine for nearly two decades. “They used to be the good guys.”

兰德·菲什金(Rand Fishkin)说：“我们已经从Google从搜索引擎到围墙花园的发展迈出了里程碑式的一步，他为企业提供了如何与Google的搜索引擎合作的建议。 “他们曾经是好人。”

On smartphones, the change has been more pronounced. From June 2016 to June 2019, the proportion of mobile searches that led to clicks on free web links dropped to 27% from 40%. No-click searches, which Fishkin says suggests the user found the information they needed on Google, rose to 62% from 56%. Meanwhile, clicks on ads more than tripled, Jumpshot data show.

在智能手机上，这一变化更为明显。 从2016年6月到2019年6月，导致点击免费Web链接的移动搜索比例从40％下降到27％。 Fishkin说，无点击搜索建议用户在Google上找到了他们所需的信息，从56％上升到62％。 同时，Jumpshot数据显示，广告点击次数增长了两倍多。

When the search engine can give straightforward answers and save users a click, it will do that, and some sites have embraced this as a new way to gain traffic, according to Danny Sullivan, public liaison for Google’s search team. The company knows “the best information is coming from the web” and it wants to support the ecosystem, he added. Google also argues that ads keep the search service free for users and are confined to the small percentage of queries that suggest someone is looking to buy something.

Google搜索团队的公共联络员丹尼·沙利文(Danny Sullivan)表示，当搜索引擎能够给出简单明了的答案并为用户节省点击时，它就会做到这一点，并且某些网站已经将其视为获取流量的新途径。 他补充说，该公司知道“最好的信息来自网络”，并且它希望支持生态系统。 谷歌还辩称，广告可以使用户免费使用搜索服务，并且只限于一小部分表明某人正在购买东西的查询中。

In some cases, Google pays to summarize other companies’ content. Sports scores are one example, according to a May 20 blog post. The company is also planning to pay select media outlets in a news service later this year. But Google doesn’t think everyone’s content is worth paying for.

在某些情况下，Google会为总结其他公司的内容而付费。 根据5月20日的博客文章 ，体育比分就是一个例子。 该公司还计划在今年晚些时候向新闻服务中的部分媒体付款 。 但是Google并不认为每个人的内容都值得付费。

Mike Moloney runs FilterGrade, a marketplace for custom filters photographers use to edit their work. He gets most of his traffic from articles on his website, such as lens reviews and camera-related top 10 lists. Recently, he noticed Google pulling photos and text straight off the site and showing it at the top of search results. There’s a link to Moloney’s company at the bottom of the section, but clicking on any of the photos brings the searcher to another Google page full of shopping ads for film stock. None of these ads are related to, or benefit, FilterGrade — unless Moloney chooses to pay Google for placement.

Mike Moloney经营FilterGrade，这是供摄影师用来编辑作品的自定义滤镜的市场。 他的大部分访问量来自网站上的文章，例如镜头评论和与相机相关的前十名。 最近，他注意到Google将照片和文字从网站上直接拉出来，并显示在搜索结果的顶部。 在该部分的底部有一个指向Moloney的公司的链接，但是单击任何一张照片都会将搜索者带到另一个Google页面，该页面上满是电影股票的购物广告。 这些广告都不与FilterGrade相关或从中受益-除非Moloney选择向Google支付展示位置费用。

“They’re doing a good job of making it subtle, almost like it’s an accident half the time,” Moloney said.

莫洛尼说：“他们在使它变得微妙的方面做得很好，几乎就像是一半的事故。”

When Moloney tweeted his frustration in April, Google’s Sullivan said the company would review the practice. Several months later, the situation remained the same.

莫洛尼(Moloney)在4月发布推文时，谷歌的沙利文(Sullivan)说，该公司将对此进行审查。 几个月后，情况保持不变。

It’s often unclear who owns content online, especially when it’s relatively easy to scrape information from one site and re-purpose it quickly on a new web page. But even when ownership is not in dispute, Google’s combination of direct answers and extra ads has pushed free links to sites further down the search results page. Fishkin’s former colleague, Pete Meyers, has been testing the same list of 10,000 search terms for years. On average, users now have to scroll down twice as far to find the first organic free link, compared with 2013.

通常不清楚是谁在线拥有内容，尤其是在相对容易从一个站点抓取信息并将其快速重新用于新网页时。 但是，即使所有权没有争议，Google的直接答案和额外广告的组合也将指向网站的免费链接推到了搜索结果页面的下方。 Fishkin的前同事Pete Meyers多年来一直在测试10,000个搜索词的相同列表。 平均而言，与2013年相比，用户现在必须向下滚动两倍才能找到第一个自然的免费链接。

“This has been the slowest but most consistent march in tech,” venture capitalist Bill Gurley wrote on Twitter last year. “If you are still holding out hope for a SEO strategy you must be intentionally ignoring all of the data in front of you,” he added, referring to search engine optimization, a popular way of improving websites to rank higher in Google’s free results.

风险资本家比尔·古利( Bill Gurley )去年在Twitter上写道： “这是科技领域中最缓慢但最稳定的发展。 “如果您仍然对SEO策略抱有希望，那么您必须有意无视您面前的所有数据，”他指的是搜索引擎优化，这是一种改善网站在Google免费结果中排名更高的流行方法。

While businesses struggle to adjust, Google’s revenue and profit have surged. In 2009, the company generated sales of $24 billion and profit of $6.5 billion. Last year, parent Alphabet Inc. reported $162 billion in revenue and $34 billion in net income. The Search business alone brought in almost $100 billion in sales.

在企业努力调整的同时，Google的收入和利润却激增。 2009年，该公司的销售额为240亿美元，利润为65亿美元。 去年，母公司Alphabet Inc.报告的收入为1620亿美元，净收入为340亿美元。 仅搜索业务一项就带来了近1000亿美元的销售额。

Much of that growth has come from adding more ads. On mobile phones, ads now take up the entire first screen for some searches. In 2015 and early 2016, when the company tested adding a fourth ad to the top of search results, there was push-back from some employees, according to people familiar with the situation who asked not to be identified discussing internal debates. The main concern was that the fourth ad was often lower quality than the first free web link right below, one of the people said. Google dismissed those worries and went ahead with the fourth ad slot because it was under pressure to keep revenue and profit growing to meet analysts’ expectations, this person added.

增长的大部分来自添加更多的广告。 现在，在手机上，广告会在整个第一屏上进行某些搜索。 据不愿透露姓名的知情人士透露，在2015年和2016年初，当公司测试在搜索结果的顶部添加第四个广告时，一些员工对此表示反对。 一位知情人士说，主要担心的是，第四个广告的质量通常低于下面的第一个免费网络链接。 这位人士补充说，谷歌消除了这些担忧，并继续进行第四个广告位，因为它面临着保持收入和利润增长以满足分析师预期的压力。

Google said it removed an ad slot on the side of the page when it added the fourth ad on top, leading to a lower number of overall ads for “highly commercial queries.” Fewer than 2% of all searches result in four or more text ads on the first page, according to the company.

谷歌表示，当它在页面顶部添加第四个广告时，便删除了页面侧面的广告位，从而导致用于“高度商业化查询”的整体广告数量减少。 该公司表示，只有不到2％的搜索结果会在首页上显示四个或更多文字广告。

Kevin Hickey, chief executive officer of Online Stores Inc., said these changes have forced him to spend more on Google search ads to keep traffic flowing to his e-commerce businesses. More than a decade ago, about two-thirds of Hickey’s Google traffic came from free, or organic, listings. But as Google increased ad slots to the top of results, that mix flipped. Organic results account for about 20% of visitors to his sites now, and he spends about 10% to 15% of his revenue on Google ads. He has raised prices, but his profit margins have shriveled.

Online Stores Inc.首席执行官Kevin Hickey说，这些变化迫使他在Google搜索广告上花费更多，以保持流量流向他的电子商务业务。 十多年前，Hickey的Google流量中约有三分之二来自免费的或自然的列表。 但是随着Google将广告位增加到结果的顶部，这种混合方式发生了变化。 现在，自然搜索结果约占其网站访问者的20％，他将收入的10％至15％用于Google广告。 他提高了价格，但利润却缩水了。

“The prices that consumers are paying are now higher because of Google’s business model,” Hickey said.

希奇说：“由于谷歌的商业模式，消费者现在支付的价格更高。”

Google doesn’t have a responsibility to pad the bottom lines of for-profit businesses. But one of the internet’s most beloved not-for-profit services has been caught up in this, too.

Google不承担填补营利性企业底线的责任。 但是，互联网上最受欢迎的非营利服务之一也已被赶上了。

Wikipedia pages were some of the first that Google mined to answer search queries directly. The company would often fail to credit the digital encyclopedia clearly, leaving Wikipedia managers wondering if they were Google partners or simply bystanders, according to a person familiar with the situation. The concern inside Wikipedia is that its relevance will slip away the more its content is read in other places. The thousands of volunteers who write and edit the site’s articles may stop contributing if they see their hard work benefiting a trillion-dollar corporation instead of a non-profit, this person said. They asked not to be identified to preserve their relationship with Google.

Wikipedia页面是Google挖掘的第一批直接回答搜索查询的页面。 一位知情人士说，该公司常常无法清楚地归功于数字百科全书，而维基百科的管理者却想知道他们是Google的合作伙伴还是仅仅是旁观者。 维基百科内部担心的是，其内容在其他地方阅读得越多，其相关性就会越低。 这位知情人士说，成千上万撰写和编辑网站文章的志愿者可能会停止捐款，如果他们看到自己的辛勤工作使一万亿美元的公司而不是非营利组织受益。 他们要求不透露身份以保持与Google的关系。

“We regularly consider the impact of third-party use of Wikipedia’s information, especially as the public increasingly consumes content outside our sites,” a Wikipedia spokeswoman said. “We’ve worked with Google over the years to improve the way they credit content from Wikipedia in the knowledge panel so that the public clearly knows when they’re reading information from Wikipedia.”

维基百科的一位女发言人说：“我们经常考虑第三方使用维基百科信息的影响，特别是随着公众越来越多地在我们网站之外消费内容。” “多年来，我们一直与Google合作，以改善他们对知识面板中Wikipedia内容的信任方式，以便公众清楚地知道他们何时从Wikipedia读取信息。”