Personally I find it quite irritating to think that someone or something is making a decision on my behalf without first consulting me. I’m an adult with a free mind capable of making my own decisions, whether they be good or bad. If I wanted someone to be my big brother and protect my every step, I’d ask for them. The thought of someone deciding what I should or shouldn’t see strikes fear into my soul. Well no not really, that’s a bit dramatic. But it certainly does annoy me!
In the world of Google Image Search however, it certainly makes a lot of sense that by default Google filters your image searches. Even an innocent search for “football” or “werwerwer” (which I won’t link to in case you have safe search off!) can throw up some unsavoury pictures that are not fit for little juniors eyes.
In the past, to change from this filtered mode to the purely open “I can take it” mode – you had to edit your preferences and turn safe search off. In terms of usability, it was very poor. You didn’t get notification that you had changed your settings until you returned to your search results page.
Now though, the guys at Google have decided to make it much easier to change your preferences. Rather than being sent to a different page, they now have an option under the search box, where you can quickly choose your level of filtering (see image below). All these small changes make a huge difference to the user experience – well done guys!
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