Google may be inaugurating a small, but high impact, novelty in its search engine. When searching for any term, it is common for the main news about it to be listed, so much so that the specific tab on it on the results page is called “Top News”. Users in the US, however, are noticing the presence of more news links in this area.
Originally viewed by the SERoundTable website and extensively tested by 9to5Google, the new feature is nothing more than an extra link, pointing to other matters related to the subject on the same site. According to the pages, there is still no knowledge of how much of the Google user base has already received the new presentation and this seems to be restricted to smartphones, as it was not possible to reproduce the same result in the desktop version.
("For Context") to better contextualize the themes sought
in the tool (Image: Playback / 9to5Google)
According to 9to5Google, not all terms produce the new function, which could be an indication that the feature may still be in testing: when searching for “senate second stimulus package” (the “emergency aid” in the USA), the site obtained the new results format. The page also points out that not all links on the news carousel showed the extra link – but this is probably related to the amount of articles on the topic on the same site.
At FreeGameGuide, we tried, unsuccessfully, to reproduce the same result, by searching for “emergency aid data” and “Charlie Brown Jr. in Tony Hawk's Pro Skater” – two very hot subjects in the media during this week -, but we managed only the pages related without the new format.
Google has not yet made official comments on the new measure, but it is possible to speculate that by expanding the availability of more information on the same topic in its search, this tool is intended to combat misinformation about more volatile terms.