Google has come under criticism after introducing a background image on the search engine’s homepage to promote its new customization features. The new look, featuring images from a number of established photographers, will run until the end of this week. However, the move has left many users frustrated by the lack of a ‘delete’ button. […]
Google has come under criticism after introducing a background image on the search engine’s homepage to promote its new customization features. The new look, featuring images from a number of established photographers, will run until the end of this week.
However, the move has left many users frustrated by the lack of a ‘delete’ button. The Official Google Blog announced the feature, stating that they would be publishing ‘inspirational’ pictures on the background of Google.co.uk for the next 24 hours, to highlight the new feature.
11/06/2010
The blog states that there ‘Are photographs of the works of Dale Chihuly, Jeff Koons, Tom Otterness, Polly Apfelbaum, Kengo Kuma, Kwon, Ki-soo and Tord Boontje, as well as some incredible photos from Yann Arthus-Bertrand and National Geographic.’
Users can choose to upload their own picture from their computer, or link to a Picasa Web Album to customise their search page.
Unfortunately, many users on the Google help pages have been asking how they can delete the background image all together and replace it with ‘classic’ Google.
If users are not a registered Google user, you may either sign up to Google and follow the above instructions, or wait 24 hours for the images to disappear.
When the feature was launched, critics commented on how similar it was to Microsoft’s search engine Bing, which changes its homepage picture on a daily basis.
Margot Williams, writing on the Inside Google blog, refered to the feature as the “Bing look option”.
http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/06/art-of-homepage.html
