semking

Elie Berreby about Generative Engine Overcomplication (GEO)

Sorry, I hit my session limit by just reading the title

AI overviews can be super frustrating and Google does not offer a master "off" switch to permanently disable, but here's my quick trick to hide these from your search results.

Whenever you perform a search, look at the filter tabs right below the search bar, where it says Images, News, Shopping, etc.

Then click the WEB tab: this will force Google to strip away the AI Overview, knowledge panels, and shopping/video carousels.

You'll be left with nothing but the classic links! :)

Elie Berreby

The newly published report centers on the inherent tension in the system-level instructions guiding how Gemini responds.

My prompt injections on Google’s Gemini model provoked a new leak of its internal system information.

Today, I will reveal some of the data contained in the upcast_info block used by Google to send instructions to Gemini. And the potential implications for Search.

This is the most beautiful AI research I’ve read this year! :D

Apologies for the image loading issues with Chromium based web browsers. I had strong (and incorrect) settings in place because I forgot 1 character somewhere in the config

That was to protect from eavesdropping and avoid modifications by man-in-the-middle attacks. I corrected + purged all cache.

Issue now resolved, just force refresh :)

I'm Elie Berreby, the author and I'm sharing first on HN. Using standard UTM parameters (utm_source, etc) on internal links is a dangerous anti-pattern.

Architecturally, it creates two massive problems: it forces web crawlers into infinite, redundant loops that destroy your crawl budget, and it permanently fractures your analytics by overwriting the user's original session acquisition source in tools like GA4.

The modern fix is to completely decouple your routing and presentation layers from your analytics.

Pass structured payloads using HTML5 data-* attributes and pick them up via event listeners. It keeps URLs clean and makes your telemetry immune to CSS refactors.

You can email me at: rxnx8obtw@mozmail.com

Elie Berreby, head of SEO & AI search at Adorama, explains how e-commerce brands can improve their visibility in AI Search answers by using agentic commerce.

Google wrote that "structured data won't make your site rank better"

Let me be clear: the official Google Search statement you read is wrong.

A good structured data strategy will positively impact organic rankings.

In this 3,500+ words article, I tried to explain ideas and concepts in detail:

1) The role of structured data in organic search

2) How structured data adds value for humans

3) How structured data helps search engines match content with user intent

4) Why I believe Google downplays the role of structured data in SEO

5) The impact of Click-Through Rates on organic rankings

6) How visual layout influences human behavior

7) How structured data reduces our cognitive load

8) Why using good structured data will increase CTR

9) How a CTR increase can create a positive divergence with the Click-Through Rate Google expects

10) How positive divergences push Google to re-evaluate rankings

I did my best to clarify things but I'm exhausted. If you spot typos or plain mistakes, PLEASE let me know. I always WELCOME constructive criticism!

I co-authored this short article for Malwarebytes.

Ask me anything :)

The life of many creators today?

AI answers, no clicks, no revenue.

My short post about the limitations of cosine similarity used for semantic matching in organic search.

My simplified guide with 30+ slides to help web publishers and creators understand the basics of crawling, rendering, indexing and conversion rate optimization (CRO)...

Any company with such a slogan (don't be evil) is a little sus if you ask me. B

But the LOVE of money (not money itself), is the root of all evil.

And this applies to everyone, everywhere, at anytime...

Why do you think SEO Strategist sounds like "Prompt Engineer"?

Why do you feel I'm hyping Grok and predict "...until you hype something else weeks later"?

I just wrote a draft concluding that Grok might be an idiot after all after a stupid answer.

I don't know how well you understand crawling, rendering, indexing and ranking in organic search but I'm not sure you know what I do on a daily basis.

I'd love to be involved in the creation of tools, and I would love to try to understand their back-end.

I'm the opposite of hype. If you want to roast me, here's a video that should give you some inspiration:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x4zEadYJYIU

No, you can use Grok[.]com without using X.

You can sign-up using X / Google / Apple accounts or email so you are not forced to be locked in an ecosystem but you are benefiting from answers coming from and index made up of scapped web pages and an index of X posts (+others)

Yes, jqp is right: you can sign-up using X / Google / Apple accounts or email...

Regarding jqp's conclusion: I hope he is wrong.

I agree that there's no privacy with G.

What have you used instead? Other search engines? LLMs?

Any centralized eco-system with interconnected products/services = privacy invasion by design.

Hey, thank you so much for this comment that I'm only discovering now!

First, I'm glad you were amused by my Linkedin trolling! :D

Next, I think we all wish the quality of Google Search were "static" but it is degrading instead.

What you mentioned is probably the reason and this is a quick observation I made at the beginning of this hiking video yesterday:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x4zEadYJYIU

Elon posted "Grok it" — instead of "Google it".

I paid attention to what the users shared under his X post and I wrote this short article showing how disappointed users are with Google Search.

As usual, I have no problem with people who strongly disagree.

Your comments are all appreciated! :)

Can you imagine executing arbitrary SQL queries via your web browser? :D

Complete database control and potential privilege escalation within the DeepSeek environment without ANY authentication...

To books, yes! 100%!

That's precisely my problem: the only alternative is worse because no one would benefit.

I did not expect this type of positive feedback... thank you.

Thanks for your feedback.

Serious shortcoming indeed.

I know it is stupid but I care.

So... AI feeding on itself? :D

Serious question, as someone who recently started writing:

• How do you guys feel about your thoughts, ideas and creativity being scraped and secretly added to the training corpus of AI models?

Ah yes: "duty to humanity"