Letter about Google compared with Yahoo

This is a letter we sent an Internet magazine in response to an earler letter from someone saying how much better Yahoo is compared to Google on the grounds that Yahoo gave fewer results.
The example he gave was that searching for noise control equipment. Google gave lots of results, Yahoo gave fewer and therefore, he said, it was easier for him to find what he wanted in Yahoo.

[Introduction skipped...]
Google, or any other search engine, is only as good as the person using it. If you don't know how to create well constructed queries your results will sometimes be garbage. Part of the reason for Google's success is that it was better at extracting sense from poorly constructed queries than AltaVista, the previous search engine of choice. Google continues to innovate to maintain its technological lead and to refine it's algorithms to present the most relevant results.

David writes "Type 'noise control' into Google and most of the results are useless".

OK let's try, first at Google.com:
11 million results - I wonder what research he put into establishing that of that 11 million "most are useless". Quite a lot look quite useful to me.
Limit the search to Google UK - the results still list over 1 million - what Google is telling you when there are millions of hits is that your search criteria are too loose.
Let's tighten up further, limit to UK and specify that we only want pages which include the exact phrase "noise control" eliminating pages that use those words but not necessarily next to each other. All we need to do is put the phrase "noise control" in quotes, now we're down to 72,000 pages. [In the 6 months between me writing that letter and placing it on this web page, that number has almost trebled!]

David claims Yahoo is better - in most cases it provides about half the number of results compared with Google, so what is it omitting? I want to have control of what information is provided, I don't want my searches limited by some editor at Yahoo deciding half the information on the topic is irrelevant.

David seems to assume that the only people looking for noise control information will be looking for companies to solve noise problems.
That isn't the assumption I would make, I could be looking for local authority and legal advice for what I can do about my noisy neighbors. Others may be wanting to find out about noise control as applicable to engineering, architecture or reducing the noise from their PC, maybe books or advice not necessarily companies.

It isn't clear from his letter just what kind of noise control David was seeking, he says Yahoo provided a list of "useful companies" but useful for what? Providing silent PC components? Providing acoustic building/engineering insulation materials. Providing soundproofing materials? Maybe what he wants is ear-plugs!

Sorry David, what you need is a psychic search engine to read your mind - or a tutorial on constructing effective search queries.
A better constructed search will get fewer but better focused results, try these:

• "noise control" neighbors
• "noise control" PC
• "noise control" soundproofing
• "noise control" earplug