Who says it serves you better results? If I type in "tea", am I searching for Tealuxe in Harvard Square or am I searching for the botanical and scientific material on a common drink or am I searching for recipes? The new "social+local" Google biases my results towards the former.
A search engine used to be a tool for reaching out into the world and finding something new. Now it searches through what I already know? What's the point in that?
Search engines were never a content discovery tool for me. I use HN, Twitter, Facebook for that. Some others use Digg, Pinterest and Reddit. When I search on a search engine, I am looking for a solution to a question that I have.
A search engine used to be a tool for reaching out into the world and finding something new. Now it searches through what I already know? What's the point in that?