phatrino
05-06-2005, 04:00 AM
Tonight (May 6, around 3am GMT) I was surfing the web with Google and noticed something odd. Every link on the results page directed me not to the original web page, as one might expect, but to a google proxified version of the page.
For example, I typed in "Search Engine Watch" and as expected, this wonderful site was at the top of the list. When I clicked the link, however, I was taken to http://www.google.com/url?sa=U&start=1&q=http://searchenginewatch.com/&e=9797
This was the case with every result on the page, for every web search I tried.
q obviously represents the requested url. start corresponds with how high the page was on google's results. I haven't been able to figure out what the sa=U is for.
I don't so much mind Google doing this, I only wish I knew what it was for. Is it part of their grand Web Accelerator? Is it to try to lift some bandwidth from third party sites? Is it (more likely) a way to keep tabs of what sites are being clicked on and how often?
Like I said, for the most part, I trust Google not to be evil, but I could find no announcement on their sight about why they were doing this. I hope an explination surfaces in the next day or two so I can go back to surfing in bliss.
For example, I typed in "Search Engine Watch" and as expected, this wonderful site was at the top of the list. When I clicked the link, however, I was taken to http://www.google.com/url?sa=U&start=1&q=http://searchenginewatch.com/&e=9797
This was the case with every result on the page, for every web search I tried.
q obviously represents the requested url. start corresponds with how high the page was on google's results. I haven't been able to figure out what the sa=U is for.
I don't so much mind Google doing this, I only wish I knew what it was for. Is it part of their grand Web Accelerator? Is it to try to lift some bandwidth from third party sites? Is it (more likely) a way to keep tabs of what sites are being clicked on and how often?
Like I said, for the most part, I trust Google not to be evil, but I could find no announcement on their sight about why they were doing this. I hope an explination surfaces in the next day or two so I can go back to surfing in bliss.