Comments on: Changing your nationality for Google

Question: Changing your nationality for Google

Ndwright — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 06:44:46 -0800

How do I change my region settings in Google?

I'm a US citizen studying in Ireland and whenever I go to google.com I'm redirected to google.ie. In theory, this shouldn't be a problem, as google.ie has a "search the web" function separate from its "search only pages from Ireland". However, when I "search the web" a majority of the results are from the UK and Ireland.

To give a specific example, I type in "postgraduate study" and postgraduate options from the UK and Ireland appear. I type in "postgraduate study in America" and study abroad pages and American visa ads appear. Even when I do advanced search and search for pages only from the States, all of the results seem to assume I'm from the U.K. I've searched from http://america.google.com and from this website, http://wwp.greenwichmeantime.com/time-zone/usa/websites/google.com/, with the same results.

http://ask.metafilter.com/67011/Help-me-google
This person seemed to have a similar problem, but nobody really answered his question, which is: how do you get Google to think you're inquiring from Stateside short of changing your IP address with a proxy?

By: Ndwright

Ndwright — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 06:56:38 -0800

Forgot to mention: Even when I use a web-based proxy like Anonymouse the same thing happens.

By: Ms. Next

Ms. Next — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 07:01:00 -0800

For me, going to www.google.com/ncr helps.

By: Ms. Next

Ms. Next — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 07:03:16 -0800

Oops, I just saw that that same website is mentioned in that previous question too. Apparently that doesn't work for you. But what does happen when you use that link?

By: Ndwright

Ndwright — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 07:08:27 -0800

Same results as america.google.com and the other website I mentioned, 7 results from the uk, 1 from Ireland, 2 from Australia.

By: Ms. Next

Ms. Next — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 07:26:12 -0800

I get those same results from the Netherlands. Are you sure people in the USA see different results? Because if I use that link I gave above, and search for 'graduate studies' (and yeah, I know that's not what you're searching for) I do get USA-oriented results. Maybe it's a question of terminology (do Americans typically use different words for it than the UK, AUS, etc.) than technology? But I guess people doing that same search while in the USA can answer that.

By: whatzit

whatzit — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 07:27:39 -0800

i hope this isn't a non-answer for you, but i'm in Japan and the postgraduate study search from google.co.jp also seems heavy on the UK/IE stuff. Is it perhaps the case that these are actually the results?
(FWIW I am also an American and never use the term postgraduate - maybe that's coloring the results? In other words, I went to university and then graduate school.)

By: TheophileEscargot

TheophileEscargot — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 07:29:16 -0800

What happens if you click the "Go to Google.com" link in the bottom right of the search page?

I'm in the UK, and doing that here permanently switches off the redirect from .com to .co.uk. (You can reverse it by clicking an equivalent link)

By: Ms. Next

Ms. Next — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 07:34:42 -0800

I think I found your answer right here. So it probably is a question of terminology, and the www.google.com/ncr link should give you the answers you're looking for for other queries.

By: Jahaza

Jahaza — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 08:02:10 -0800

Yeah.. I'm in the US and get australia, uk, ireland, and one general international page on the first page of results for "postgraduate study".

"Graduate School" gets me all American results.

By: Jahaza

Jahaza — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 08:02:36 -0800

Which is to say I think it's a matter of terminology.

By: 517

517 — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 08:14:03 -0800

I'm in America and here are my first 10 google results for "postgraduate study" (no quotes).

www.prospects.ac.uk/pg/ - 52k - Cached - Similar pages

www.prospects.ac.uk/cms/ShowPage/Home_page/About_postgrad_study/why/p!eklFeFX

www.graduatecareers.com.au/content/view/full/123 - 14k -

www.postgrad.riverhall.co.uk/ - 38k - Cached - Similar

www.ncl.ac.uk/postgraduate/ - 31k - Cached - Similar pages

www2.warwick.ac.uk/study/postgraduate/ - 25k - Cached -

www.topuniversities.com/gradschool/ - 31k - Cached -

www.sussex.ac.uk/pgstudy - 7k - Cached - Similar pages

www.postgrad.ie/ - 79k - Cached - Similar pages

www.manchester.ac.uk/postgraduate/ - 13k - Cached -

By: fiTs

fiTs — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 08:29:43 -0800

I also think it's a matter of terminology.
But to answer your question anyway, use Google Suggest. It seems to be 'region free', or at least not UK specific.

By: Ndwright

Ndwright — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 10:55:44 -0800

I guess I've been in the British Isles too long, forgot "postgraduate study" wasn't a universal expression. Thanks, everyone.

By: Ulleskelf

Ulleskelf — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 11:27:07 -0800

Make your Google shortcut/bookmark one to a Google.com search result page. Any search done from that page will then give you US results.

Example (I live in the UK):

If I go to Google.co.uk and search for food, the first to sites I get are the BBC Food microsite and the UK Food Standards Agency.
The resulting URL is www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=food&btnG=Google+Search&meta=.

If you then change the .co.uk to .com (and strip out the other stuff you don't need), you're left with www.google.com/search?q=food. That search now brings up the Food Network and Wikipedia. Now enter something in the search box of that results page, and you get the US version of the results.

By: nakedcodemonkey

nakedcodemonkey — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 12:40:36 -0800

This is where the "site:" keyword comes in handy.

postgraduate study -site:uk -site:ie

postgraduate study site:edu