Meaningless number: 230,000,000

http://www.thereforesystems.com/meaningless-number-230000000/

by deepakkapoor • 14 years ago

4 6 14 years ago

lucianof2• 14 years ago

I don't think it's a meaningless number. Maybe I want to know compare the frequency of two terms, then Google's estimate of results is pretty useful. On the other hand result number 230,000,000 is certainly not useful. Well, it might be a little useful, but there are 229,999,999 documents that Google thinks are more useful to me, so it is a reasonable optimization by Google to not actually prepare a results page for it.

deepakkapoor3• 14 years ago

But what value does displaying that number add to the activity undertaken by the user?

bostonpete• 14 years ago

When I'm trying to choose between two alternative spelling or phrasings of a concept, I'll frequently google the two alternatives I'm considering to get a sense for which is more common.

lucianof2• 14 years ago

Maybe the user wants to find out if there is more weather data for Sydney, Melbourne or Canberra by comparing the number of results. Sydney has the lead, btw.

Meaningless number: 230,000,000

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