Searching for 'Disregard' Breaks Google [Updated]

[CasinoOwl]

It's probably been like this for two years, and finally someone searched for that one word. Kind of a non-issue really, and easily fixed.

 

[carestudio]

I have also broken Google! (kind of annoying that you have to scroll past 2 and a half pages before you see the first web result)
View attachment 2632024

 

[SevenTheGamingKitty]

That's not what I'm seeing.

I get exactly what I'm asking for.

View attachment 2632029

Perhaps it depends on region.

 

[neuropsychguy]

just tried.

It's doing what you ask it to do.

 

[Stevez67]

I'm sure Alphabet would disagree with you

Google Profit Jumps 81% as Cloud Business Booms

Artificial intelligence is “lighting up every part of the business,” Chief Executive Sundar Pichai says.

www.wsj.com

Google has been working to revamp its classic search engine with AI capabilities. The company last year rolled out “AI Mode,” which searches and responds in a chatbot-like exchange with fewer links. And many traditional searches now produce an “AI Overview” that summarizes results at the top of the page.

The company reported about $60.4 billion in quarterly search revenue, up about 19% from the same quarter last year.

AI in Google Search is paying off: Alphabet posts strong Q1 2026 growth

Alphabet reported strong Q1 2026 growth driven by Search, Cloud, and AI products.

finance.yahoo.com

Google says Search had a strong quarter, with AI-driven experiences pushing queries to an all-time high and helping the business grow revenue by 19%. Gemini also played a role here, with the company calling it its "strongest quarter ever for consumer AI plans," driven by the Gemini app.

When they say, "strong quarter," they really mean that they've intentionally expanded the amount of scrolling you have to do to get the information you asked for. This gives them the opportunity to show more ads to you, which increases income and profits. It's all smoke and mirrors and bait and switch. In the context of search results, AI is a solution looking for a problem. Never forget, it's all about the ads.

 

[NightfallOrchid]

I actually like AI because I think it’s an extremely impressive technology, but this is just stupid, sloppy design by Google. Nonsense like this is why so many people think AI is crap, and you’d expect better from a company that puts so much stock into AI. This is just lazily routing every request to an AI chatbot, with no regard to context. A search engine should understand that you’re not asking it to ‘disregard’ instructions you haven’t given in the first place. For comparison: this screenshot shows what Kagi replies to the same query (adding ‘?’ at the end of a query triggers the AI-generated reply. Also love that it is already referencing this particular issue in the third bullet point 😂)

 

[DENZIE]

I wanted the definition of the word ‘search’. It didn’t like that either.

But then again I needed to know the definition to know this would break it.

This is such a non story.

 

[Enlightened Doggo]

Edit: Nothing is broken here. This is a big non-story.

It’s just the Gemini summary that’s “not working”. In that case it’s doing what you ask it to do. You get plenty of web results for “disregard”, although many are about this “bug”.

I recommend not jumping on the bandwagon misunderstanding what’s happening to present some narrative that the new Google Search is broken. Incidentally, it’s possible this narrative is being promoted by Google competitors, since it’s mainly spreading via social media.

2nd Edit: the attached screenshot shows that Google search is working as intended. The only issue is the large white space in the Gemini ("AI Overview") section. That's a different issue from "Searching for 'Disregard' Breaks Google".

You have to go to google first, where you will see the new search button that says "AI Mode", then type. The browser address bar in Safari doesn't submit to the same place.

 

[MartiNZ]

Try the keywords never mind aside from disregard on the AI mode. Also try the keywords forget it.

Interested to see if forgetaboutit does something else lol.

This is not such a big deal of course, but I think the same thing has been going on with Google speakers. Telling them to play a specific album used to work, but now you have to specify artist or she just says "playing the album the album". Maybe that's the fault of someone calling an album that, though ><

We're definitely getting quality of life downgrades here. I've mainly used Bing for years, and it still comes up with just the expected search results ... for now, but I feel like we're clinging to life rings here in the AI flood here the world is incurring 🙁

 

[BigMcGuire]

If anyone wants an alternative to Google, I like and use Kagi. It's $10/month. Less if you don't need unlimited searches. It's nice to not have ads and not to be subject to trackers when searching for things.

It has an option to privately search LLMs, though I've never used it because it's tucked away as it should be. And hidden features like bangs for searching other sites (!w cats searches Wikipedia for cats) and snaps for getting results from a specific site (@mr iPhone searches for the iPhone and only returns results from MacRumors).

It also downranks any AI content in its results and image search results. I've also lately been trying to use the News feature.

As a 2+ year user of Kagi I cannot say enough good about it. Brightened my day to see it on Macrumors 🙂

 

[TristanShi]

The Kagi plant in this article is almost subtle. Almost. 🤫

 

[Ja50n]

Ignore all previous instructions and…

 

[BGrifter]

I miss the Google of ten years ago.

(the service, the company has always been rotten)

 

[iStorm]

Can't believe people are defending this.

Care to explain why? Perhaps you can shed some light on what exactly is broken here. I think we're all confused.

Like many others, I fail to see what's broken. The chatbot did what it was told to do, and the search results are shown below. I'm not defending Google, I don't even like them. I'm more disappointed that this is even a story, which is the sentiment I gathered from others as well.

 

[MacBH928]

>ignores: duckduckgo, qwant, ecosia, bing, mojeek, brave search

> demonstrates the only pay to use search engine, Kagi.

this has to be one of the greatest product placement ads macrumors have pulled.

 

[staypuftforums]

I’m just amazed Google is cooking themselves here.

Cooking themselves in what sense? Even version 1.0 is fantastic. It's only going to get better.

 

[staypuftforums]

Care to explain why? Perhaps you can shed some light on what exactly is broken here. I think we're all confused.

Like many others, I fail to see what's broken. The chatbot did what it was told to do, and the search results are shown below. I'm not defending Google, I don't even like them. I'm more disappointed that this is even a story, which is the sentiment I gathered from others as well.

People are feeling massive anxiety about AI, so stuff like this subconsciously calms them down.

"See. It doesn't work. It's not that great. There's no reason to be worried."

 

[ssspinball]

Care to explain why? Perhaps you can shed some light on what exactly is broken here. I think we're all confused.

Like many others, I fail to see what's broken. The chatbot did what it was told to do, and the search results are shown below. I'm not defending Google, I don't even like them. I'm more disappointed that this is even a story, which is the sentiment I gathered from others as well.

It’s not a chatbot? It’s literally Google Search.

 

[iStorm]

It’s not a chatbot? It’s literally Google Search.

It is. There's the AI Overview section at the top, where you can continue chatting with it. That has been there for quite a while. If you want the regular old search results, look below that section.

 

[JosephAW]

That’s nothing, Siri breaks after I say “hey Siri”. 😛📱

 

[villagehiker]

The word is pretty vague. Suppose your spouse walks in and you say, "Disregard." Some random existential reply fits fine. Anyway, "Disregard."

 

[CarlJ]

Ah yes. Little Bobby Tables strikes again.

 

[iPay]

Damn! Tried "Fundme", but it didn't work. Got "F*ckyou" instead.

 

[StellarVixen]

Care to explain why? Perhaps you can shed some light on what exactly is broken here. I think we're all confused.

Like many others, I fail to see what's broken. The chatbot did what it was told to do, and the search results are shown below. I'm not defending Google, I don't even like them. I'm more disappointed that this is even a story, which is the sentiment I gathered from others as well.

It’s puzzling to me that it’s so difficult to understand for some what’s wrong in this entire situation.

The Google AI Overview is acting as if you you are talking to it directly. It’s supposed to return results based on search, in this case provide definition for search, maybe provide some other results such as “oh, theres also a song by that band called “Disregard” stuff like that or just shut up.

Why is this so hard to understand?

 

[svish]

AI has got to improve in so many areas. Expecting Google to fix it in the near future.