First of all let us make sure we all know the difference between lions and coots. As far as I can recall, lions are huge, snarly, growly, land animals that are liable to eat you if you cross their path. This appears to be confirmed by Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lions) but of course Wikipedia could be wrong. Coots are medium sized water birds (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coots) and the worst that could befall you should you antagonise one is a severe pecking.
I was walking by the Thames in Caversham today and took several photos of the birds on the river. One was of two coots who were having what appeared to be a minor domestic or an argument over territory, but a friend suggested to me that what I saw was coot mating behaviour. What do you do in a situation such as this? You Google.
My search on coots mating behaviour came up with:
Where the [expletive deleted] did the lions come from?? I just do not understand how Google managed to replace coots with lions. One is a water bird with wings, feathers, and a beak and the other a large, aggressive land mammal with fur, claws and big teeth. But Google, yet again, has decided to go off and run its own search. (See my posting Oi! Google – you have seriously overstepped the mark http://www.rba.co.uk/wordpress/2011/01/03/oi-google-you-have-seriously-overstepped-the-mark/).
So did I get what I wanted by clicking on “Search instead for coots mating behaviour”? Yes I did, but Google still thinks I really want to search for lions and asks “Did you mean: lions mating behaviour”. Google has totally lost the plot.
And the photo that started it all? That can be found on my Flickr account at http://www.flickr.com/photos/rbainfo/5438769506/. I think you will agree that coots are very different from lions (http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:P_l_Bleyenberghi.jpg)
WTF…. I guess that a coot is a living creature and a lion is a living creature and perhaps they are both viewed as synonyms. What’s even odder is when I repeated the search after clicking on the “Did you mean” it got it right – it remembered my correction in my web-history. I also put a + in front of coot and that got it right first time – hence my thought it could be a synonym. (Had to clear my web-history first though each time. What a pain 🙁 )
Seems as though Google is lion about it’s results. Has it got no pride any longer? (Or are we just a pair of old coots who shouldn’t be so picky?).
Groan….. too early in the morning for that sort of humour, but I see you posted your comment last night so I’ll let it pass:-)
Just checked in the browser where I have enabled web history and found as you did that running the search a second time gives the coots. Google still asks me, though, Did you mean lions mating behaviour and putting a plus before coots did give me what I wanted but Google still asked Did you mean +lions mating behaviour.
I’ve just tried putting a tilde (~) before coots, and Google gave me “Showing results for ~lions mating behaviour. Search instead for ~coots mating behaviour”
I give up 🙁
There does seem to be increased development of SERPS, which are made live with what could be considered to be bugs.
I have come across popular search terms where the 2nd or 3rd result is just a holding page and can see no logical reason why it should be there. One term the doamin has been there for over a month.