how the products are being used. As we saw more people posting photos on Google+, for example, we said ‘Wouldn’t it be useful to surface them on search pages?’ We adapt to our user base and try to do what’s best for them.”
It would seem to be only a matter of time before Google goes beyond Web results and images and begins to incorporate other kinds of personal content it knows about into Search plus Your World, such as your documents on Google Docs or the songs you’ve stored on Google Music.
But if you decide, despite Google’s best efforts, that Search plus Your World isn’t best for you, there are two ways to sidestep it. One is a new “toggle,” a pair of buttons in the upper right corner of each search result page that will allow you to see results with or without personal content. You can also change your overall search settings to include or exclude personal results by default. The new level of personalization, in other words, includes the ability to opt out of the personalized suggestion features entirely.
“It’s the ultimate level of control,” Kamdar says. But he doubts many people will opt out. “We have done a lot of testing and analysis, and we think we are at the right balance.”
Kamdar says Google is rolling out the new Search plus Your World features in stages. The features should become visible to everyone using Google.com in English by the end of the day Thursday.
Xconomy goes the extra mile to bring you the deepest coverage of tech trends. Compare this story to:
Google Embeds Social Directly Into Search (But by Social, It Means Google+) (AllThingsD)
Google search gets its biggest change in a decade with a dose of Google+ (VentureBeat)
They Did It: Google Personalizes Search & It Is Not Evil (ReadWriteWeb)
Google Merges Search and Google+ Into Social Media Juggernaut (Mashable)
Google Fuses Google+ Into Search — And There Are Bigger Changes Afoot (TechCrunch)
