When Google launched Google+, it said the new social network would find its way into Google's many other products, and now it's spreading into the company's biggest product — Google search results are now being personalized based on your Google+ activity. The new "Search, plus Your World" feature looks through your Google+ profile for relevant things shared with you, things your friends shared, or other relevant pages and profiles, and integrates them into your search results even if they're privately shared only with you. When you search for names, the profiles of people in your Google+ circles also show up at the top of your results. You can turn off the personalization, but in doing so you'll also remove Google's previous tailoring efforts, like using your search history to improve results. In reality, it's just a way to search Google+ from Google's homepage, but it's yet another example of how central Google thinks its social network is to its business. Search, plus Your World is being rolled out to users now, so look for a lot of Google+ in your search results soon.
Google's 'Search, plus Your World' personalizes search results using Google+

There are 21 Comments. Add yours.
Its your world and Google wants to live in it.
Posted on Jan 10, 2012 | 10:51 AM EST reply Recommend (3) Flag actions
I guess that’s better than “it’s Google’s world and you are invited”.
Posted on Jan 10, 2012 | 2:24 PM EST reply Recommend (1) Flag actions
Bing does this with Facebook and is very effective IMHO. For example, when I search for ‘Nokia Lumia 800 review’ it shows me the Engadget review first because most of my friends have ‘liked’ Engadget. I don’t know how successful it will be with Google+ since almost none of my friends use it anymore.
Posted on Jan 10, 2012 | 10:56 AM EST reply Recommend Flag actions
your friends (emphasis on your) dont use it so success is questionable. makes sense. /s
Posted on Jan 10, 2012 | 11:11 AM EST reply Recommend Flag actions
No he’s absolutely right. If none of HIS friends use Google+ integration, that feature will be absolutely useless for him. And that situation is certainly not unique.
Personally, I’m still just waiting for the Google Search app to reliably determine my location instead of just randomly searching for locations in another state on the other side of the country.
Posted on Jan 10, 2012 | 11:20 AM EST reply Recommend (3) Flag actions
youre right. for him. Something that wasnt specified.
Posted on Jan 10, 2012 | 11:37 AM EST reply Recommend Flag actions
Although I think it is true for MOST PEOPLE, which is an important idea. Google Plus hasn’t taken off and still is a fraction of a fraction of the size of Facebook. So, for MOST PEOPLE, what Evil Weasel said is true.
Posted on Jan 30, 2012 | 1:34 PM EST reply Recommend Flag actions
I like how you either accept the skewing of results based on your friend’s questionable tastes or you can’t even get searches based on your own. Because obviously I’m part of a hive mind, aka a sub-demographic that Google can sell to marketers. Screw it, I’ll settle for the wider net cast by having NO search history.
Posted on Jan 10, 2012 | 11:19 AM EST reply Recommend (4) Flag actions
Google is assuming that you curate a group of friends based on shared interests. It’s not Google’s fault that you have bad taste in friends.
Posted on Jan 11, 2012 | 3:27 PM EST reply Recommend Flag actions
Is this the google fanboy version of “you’re holding it wrong”?
Posted on Jan 13, 2012 | 5:03 PM EST reply Recommend Flag actions
Just delete your Google+. I’m considering it. (This is possible, right?)
Posted on Jan 13, 2012 | 11:37 AM EST reply Recommend Flag actions
Not that big of a deal as far as I’m concerned. Even if results from my friends interfere with my personalised search results it’s not exactly difficult to skim over results I don’t want.
Posted on Jan 10, 2012 | 11:28 AM EST reply Recommend Flag actions
Google, stop peering into every aspect of my life under the guise of making your search easier. It has been easy to use since you launched it some 15 years ago.
Posted on Jan 10, 2012 | 11:46 AM EST reply Recommend Flag actions
Let’s stop innovation. Everything is good enough.
If you don’t want to use this feature, don’t.
Posted on Jan 10, 2012 | 11:59 AM EST reply Recommend (9) Flag actions
Well said. Though you (and many others no doubt) may not like Google learning more details about us, their choice is to continue to evolve and monetize via advertising, or stop giving all of their services away for free.
Posted on Jan 10, 2012 | 10:51 PM EST reply Recommend Flag actions
This tendency towards personalized content is horrible. It causes the little bubble we isolate ourselves in to become even smaller, when internet should allow for the direct opposite.
For ‘Lebanon’ one user gets news on the revolution and another travel tips. There’s an abyss of difference between those two worlds.
Better to teach people to fish (i.e. how to use the search syntax) or it’s time to redo the interface form scratch.
Posted on Jan 10, 2012 | 11:53 AM EST reply Recommend (4) Flag actions
lol teach people search syntax. good one.
Posted on Jan 10, 2012 | 5:44 PM EST reply Recommend (1) Flag actions
What the…
Posted on Jan 10, 2012 | 3:28 PM EST reply Recommend Flag actions
Works very good. At least I got the ability to sort out general results from the “social” stuff.
Posted on Jan 10, 2012 | 4:32 PM EST reply Recommend Flag actions
So what happens if I haven’t signed up to google plus, at last not with my “real” google profile? Am I unaffected? I tried + with a fake gmail and did not feel the need for more “plussing”.
Posted on Jan 11, 2012 | 5:14 PM EST reply Recommend Flag actions
You can’t really blame Google can you? The web is a dynamic place. When people search today, it is no longer just to find websites, it’s to find relevant information. And G+ is currently google’s only source of information. I’m sure they were aware that it would get this reaction, but as Google has shown in the past, you’ll thank them for it.
I’m not sure how many of you people have actually just trusted google and gone with it, but I for one have, and the results are really amazing. The whole +1 system works wonders. When +1 something on my Android phone, or an ad on the web, google can give me the most relevant results.
People may argue that Google is just pushing it’s own services, so it can monopolise, but what say Facebook opened up their data to Google, then things would have gone very differently. If joining google plus gives me more relevant results, more personized results, then what the problem? It’s an incentive to join.
And also, if anything, this will pressurize Facebook and Twitter even more to share their data.
Posted on Jan 13, 2012 | 4:01 AM EST reply Recommend Flag actions
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