The slow decline of Google search results has been deeply depressing. Once upon a time, the tech giant was the undisputed master of the search engine, leaving its dotcom boom competitors in the dust in the early 2000s. Now? It’s a barely functioning headache.
The latest development – and the straw that’s breaking the camel’s back for many users – is their new “AI Overview” mode, which parses the results for your search and delivers an AI-written summary. But, as you might expect from AI, it’s just making stuff up:
Users are fleeing to rivals like DuckDuckGo, but it turns out there is a way to dial back the clock on Google and get the same results you used to see.
The secret command
All you need to do is add “&udm=14” to end of the address of your Google Search query and it will strip out the AI-generated garbage in favor of actual websites you can click on and read, just like in the old days!
It appears this mode is intended for users with limited internet access or those requiring text-based results. But, whatever the reason, it works and many users are rejoicing that they finally (sort of) have the old Google Search back.
I’m going to be using this all the time from now on, as I’m tired of either trying to filter out what the broken AI thinks I want to see, as well as having to add “Reddit” to any queries I have in a futile attempt to avoid AI-generated slop designed to scoop up ad clicks.
There’s only one wrinkle here. For people to find this article and learn this key info it’ll have to dodge Google’s AI and, somehow, we suspect this machine will not like users opting out of its digital clutches.