GOOGLE

Google Shows Paywall Content in Featured Snippets

Published

4 years ago

October 29, 2019

google shows paywall content in featured snippets via martinibuster

A member of the search marketing community tweeted his surprise that Google ranked a paywalled web page in the featured snippets. Google’s official description of featured snippets precludes content that cannot be clicked through to be read.

But other documentation states that paywalled content is acceptable for Google Search as well as Google News. In addition to requirements for structured data that is missing, it’s unclear if this featured snippet is a mistake or if Google meant to do that.

Screenshot of a tweet by @shendison

Scott Hendison (@shendison) tweeted his opinion that paywalled content does not belong in Google search results.

“I personally think paywalled content doesnt belong in @Google SERPs unless they’re marked, but I never realized they can even get featured snippets like this
@Salem_Statesman content.”

Screenshot of the featured snippet in Google's search result that contains a paywalled web page

This is a screenshot of the featured snippet that contains a paywalled web page that once clicked through does not display the content.

What is Paywalled Content?

Paywalled content is content that is available for the cost of a subscription. Only subscribers can read it.

Google shows paywalled content in Google News. The idea is that people who read the news will find value in subscribing to a newspaper to read the excellent content they are unable to see.

In Google’s Publisher Help Center Google has also said that paywalled content is allowed in Search and News.

So it appears that in fact, paywalled content is allowed to be shown in search. But there are rules that publishers are encouraged to follow.

What are the Rules for Paywalls?

According to Google, sites with Paywalls are encouraged to use structured data that indicates the content is paywalled.

Here is what Google’s official announcement from 2017 says of the structured data:

“Sites with paywalls are strongly encouraged to apply the new structured data to their pages, because without it, the paywall may be interpreted as a form of cloaking, and the pages would then be removed from search results.”

Google’s developer page for paywalled content and structured data says:

“This structured data helps Google differentiate paywalled content from the practice of cloaking, which violates our guidelines.”

Google recommends this section for the structured data that tells Google that a web page is behind a paywall:

“isAccessibleForFree”: “False”,
“hasPart”:
{
“@type”: “WebPageElement”,
“isAccessibleForFree”: “False”,
“cssSelector” : “.paywall”

That entire part of the code is “strongly encouraged” by Google to be in the structured data for paywalled content.

The news page that is ranking in Google’s featured snippets does not use the recommended structured data.

The structured data that is “strongly encouraged” is missing from the web page that is ranking in Google’s featured snippets. I visited the web page with my browser set to emulate Googlebot and reviewed the structured data the web page shows to Google. The “isAccessibleForFree” part was missing.

Additionally, according to Google’s publisher center help page, the publisher must use a “Flexible Sampling model” which allows users to sample a news page. But that may not be happening.

I visited the web page and was immediately blocked, even though I’ve never visited the web page. I checked with different browsers and I received the same message telling me I did not have access to the page. I was not allowed to sample any page. I was blocked and solicited for money.

screenshot of a paywall

Here is what Google’s Publisher Help Center says:

“As a result of our learning, we decided to transition from our FCF program and its fixed, free-sampling requirement to a Flexible Sampling model. Publishers determine their own optimal rate of sampling based on their ongoing experience using free samples to attract new users and using the paywall to elicit user registration or subscription.”

According to Google’s 2017 announcement, web sites are strongly encouraged to use the structured data. But that does not explicitly say they required to. Nevertheless, the Google Developer page says that web pages that lack the structured data could be removed if they are perceived as “cloaking” which is the practice of showing one page to Google and a different page to users.

Are Paywalls Supposed to be In Featured Snippets?

According to Google’s Help Center page about how featured snippets work, featured snippets are meant to be read as well as clicked so that a user can read the web pages. Google does not make an exception for paywalled web pages.

Screenshot of Google's help page describing how featured snippets work

According to Google’s help page, a user is supposed to be able to click through the featured snippets and “read the page itself.”

A paywalled web page appears to be incompatible with featured snippets because a user cannot click through to read the web page.

Featured Snippets Issue is Complicated

Paywalled content is allowed in Google Search.
Paywalled content is does not conform with how featured snippets are supposed to work, by allowing users to click through and read the site.
Web pages with paywalled content are strongly encouraged to use structured data to tell Google their pages are paywalled.
But the paywalled web page in the featured snippets does not use the structured data, so that does that mean it’s presence is a mistake?

Lost in the confusion is the user experience. How do you feel about it? Should Google featured snippets allow paywalled content?

Searchenginejournal.com

GOOGLE

Google’s Next-Gen AI Chatbot, Gemini, Faces Delays: What to Expect When It Finally Launches

Published

6 days ago

December 4, 2023

Max

In an unexpected turn of events, Google has chosen to postpone the much-anticipated debut of its revolutionary generative AI model, Gemini. Initially poised to make waves this week, the unveiling has now been rescheduled for early next year, specifically in January.

Gemini is set to redefine the landscape of conversational AI, representing Google’s most potent endeavor in this domain to date. Positioned as a multimodal AI chatbot, Gemini boasts the capability to process diverse data types. This includes a unique proficiency in comprehending and generating text, images, and various content formats, even going so far as to create an entire website based on a combination of sketches and written descriptions.

Originally, Google had planned an elaborate series of launch events spanning California, New York, and Washington. Regrettably, these events have been canceled due to concerns about Gemini’s responsiveness to non-English prompts. According to anonymous sources cited by The Information, Google’s Chief Executive, Sundar Pichai, personally decided to postpone the launch, acknowledging the importance of global support as a key feature of Gemini’s capabilities.

Gemini is expected to surpass the renowned ChatGPT, powered by OpenAI’s GPT-4 model, and preliminary private tests have shown promising results. Fueled by significantly enhanced computing power, Gemini has outperformed GPT-4, particularly in FLOPS (Floating Point Operations Per Second), owing to its access to a multitude of high-end AI accelerators through the Google Cloud platform.

SemiAnalysis, a research firm affiliated with Substack Inc., expressed in an August blog post that Gemini appears poised to “blow OpenAI’s model out of the water.” The extensive compute power at Google’s disposal has evidently contributed to Gemini’s superior performance.

Google’s Vice President and Manager of Bard and Google Assistant, Sissie Hsiao, offered insights into Gemini’s capabilities, citing examples like generating novel images in response to specific requests, such as illustrating the steps to ice a three-layer cake.

While Google’s current generative AI offering, Bard, has showcased noteworthy accomplishments, it has struggled to achieve the same level of consumer awareness as ChatGPT. Gemini, with its unparalleled capabilities, is expected to be a game-changer, demonstrating impressive multimodal functionalities never seen before.

During the initial announcement at Google’s I/O developer conference in May, the company emphasized Gemini’s multimodal prowess and its developer-friendly nature. An application programming interface (API) is under development, allowing developers to seamlessly integrate Gemini into third-party applications.

As the world awaits the delayed unveiling of Gemini, the stakes are high, with Google aiming to revolutionize the AI landscape and solidify its position as a leader in generative artificial intelligence. The postponed launch only adds to the anticipation surrounding Gemini’s eventual debut in the coming year.

GOOGLE

Google Brings Bard Students Math and Coding Education in the Summer

Published

6 months ago

June 8, 2023

Entireweb News Bot

$Google Brings Bard Students Math and Coding Education in the Summer$

Google is stepping up its AI efforts this summer by sending Bard, its high-profile chatbot, to summer school. The aim? To boost the bot’s math and coding smarts. These developments are excellent news— when Bard first debuted, it was admittedly not a finished product. But Google is steadily plugging away at it, and have now implemented implicit code execution for logical prompts, and handy Google Sheets’ integration to take it to the next level.

Thanks to implicit code execution, Bard can respond to inquiries requiring calculation or computation with Python code snippets running in the background. What’s even more amazing is that coders can take this generated code and modify it for their projects. Though Google is still apprehensive about guaranteeing the accuracy of Bard’s answers, this feature is said to improve the accuracy of math and word problems by an impressive 30%.

In addition to this, Bard can now export directly to Sheets when asked about tables. So, you don’t need to worry about copying and pasting, which comes with the risk of losing formatting or data.

From the company’s I/O keynote address, it is clear that they are focused on making the most of what Bard can offer. As they continue to speak highly of the chatbot, we’re sure to expect more features and capabilities when the summer comes around.

GOOGLE

Google Bard vs. ChatGPT: which is the better AI chatbot?

Published

10 months ago

February 20, 2023

Entireweb News Bot

Google Bard vs. ChatGPT: which is the better AI chatbot?

Google Bard and ChatGPT are two of the most prominent artificial intelligence (AI) chatbots available in 2023. But which is better? Both offer natural language responses to natural language inputs, using machine learning and millions of data points to craft useful, informative responses. Most of the time. These AI tools aren’t perfect yet, but they point to an exciting future of AI assistant search and learning tools that will make information all the more readily available.

As similar as these chatbots are, they also have some distinct differences. Here’s how ChatGPT and Google Bard measure up against one another.

Which is better, Google Bard or ChatGPT?

This is a tricky question to answer, as at the time of writing, you can only use Google Bard if you’re part of a select group of early beta testers. As for its competition, you can use ChatGPT right now, completely for free. You may have to contend with a waitlist, but if you want to skip that, there’s a paid-for Plus version offering those interested in a more complete tool the option of paying for the privilege.

Still, when Google Bard becomes more widely available, it should offer credible competition for ChatGPT. Both use natural language models — Google Bard uses Google’s internal LaMDA (Language Model for Dialogue Applications), whereas ChatGPT uses an older GPT-3 language model. Google Bard bases its responses to questions on more recent data, with ChatGPT mainly trained on data that was available prior to 2021. This is similar to how Microsoft’s Bing Chat works.

We’ll have to reserve judgment on which is the more capable AI chatbot until we get time to play with Google Bard ourselves, but it looks set to be a close contest when it is more readily available.

Are Google Bard and ChatGPT available yet?

As mentioned, ChatGPT is available in free and paid-for tiers. You might have to sit in a queue for the free version for a while, but anyone can play around with its capabilities.

Google Bard is currently only available to limited beta testers and is not available to the wider public.

Banner of Google Bard intro from February 6.

What’s the difference between Google Bard and ChatGPT?

ChatGPT and Google Bard are very similar natural language AI chatbots, but they have some differences, and are designed to be used in slightly different ways — at least for now. ChatGPT has been used for answering direct questions with direct answers, mostly correctly, but it’s caused a lot of consternation among white collar workers, like writers, SEO advisors, and copy editors, since it has also demonstrated an impressive ability to write creatively — even if it has faced a few problems with accuracy and plagiarism.

Still, Microsoft has integrated ChatGPT into its Bing search engine to give users the ability to ask direct questions of the search engine, rather than searching for terms of keywords to find the best results. It has also built it into its Teams communications tool, and it’s coming to the Edge browser in a limited form. The Opera browser has also pledged to integrate ChatGPT in the future.

ChatGPT	Google Bard
Accessible through ChatGPT site. Only text responses are returned via queries.	Integrated with Google Search. You only need to change a Google setting to get your regular search results when using Google Bard AI, and vice versa.
ChatGPT produces answers from its trained database from 2021 and before.	Google Apprentice Bard AI will be able to answer real-time questions.
Based on GPT (Generative Pre-trained Transformer).	Based on LaMDA (Language Model for Dialogue Applications).
Service has a free and paid plan option (called ChatGPT Plus).	Service is free.
Has built-in plagiarism tool called GPT-2 Output Detector.	No built-in plagiarism detection tool.
Available now	Still in beta test phase

Google Bard was mainly designed around augmenting Google’s own search tool, however it is also destined to become an automated support tool for businesses without the funds to pay for human support teams. It will be offered to customers through a trained AI responder. It is likely to be integrated into the Chrome browser and its Chromium derivatives before long. Google is also expected to open up Google Bard to third-party developers in the future.

Under the hood, Google Bard uses Google’s LaMDA language model, while ChatGPT uses its own GPT3 model. ChatGPT is based on slightly older data, restricted in its current GPT3 model to data collected prior to 2022, while Google Bard is built on data provided on recent years too. However, that doesn’t necessarily make it more accurate, as Google Bard has faced problems with incorrect answers to questions, even in its initial unveiling.

ChatGPT also has a built-in plagiarism checker, while Google Bard does not, but Google Bard doesn’t have the creative applications of ChatGPT just yet.