Looks like Google realized that some of its users prefer the plain-Jane Google page rather than the Bing Bling version, and now there’s an option to remove the background image. Simply click on the lower left link for “Remove background image” and you’ll have the familiar Google-on-white-background page you’re familiar with.
June 10, 2010
Google background images irritate some
Google opted today to splash some color on its trusty, rusty search page using background images. Some aren’t so hip to the change, said by some to be a response to Microsoft’s BING search engine.
I’d be okay with the change as long as it didn’t slow down the loading of my Google page and I had the option to turn it off. While this could have been a welcome change, Google screwed up when it didn’t give users the ability to disable it.
Attention, Google: I use your search engine for the results it provides me, not because it’s pretty (or not pretty, as the case may be). Give your users the option to turn off the BING bling and everything will be cool.
Update 3 PM: Google listened, and now users can get the old-fashioned page back again. Thanks, Goog!
The BP oil disaster: we’re all responsible
SF Gate columnist Mark Morford nails the BP/Gulf disaster, pointing the finger ultimately back to us and our insatiable need for more oil. This is exactly how I was feeling about the disaster.
Morford writes:
I think the most disturbingly satisfying thrill of this entire event — and it is, in a way, a perverse thrill — comes from understanding, at a very core level, our shared responsibility, our co-creation of the foul demon currently unleashed.
What a thing we have created. What an extraordinary horror our rapacious need for cheap, endless energy hath unleashed; it’s a monster of a scale and proportion we can barely even fathom.
Because if you’re honest, no matter where you stand, no matter your politics, religion, income or mode of transport, you see this beast of creeping death and you understand: That is us. The spill may be many things, but more than anything else it is a giant, horrifying mirror.
Go read the rest. And then start thinking of where we go from here.