Google Trends: CS-related phrases at an all-time low

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Recent observations from Google Trends indicate a significant decline in searches for terms like "computer science," "software engineering," and "programming," including specific languages such as C++ and Java. This trend raises questions about the shifting landscape of internet usage, suggesting that Google is increasingly being utilized by a broader audience beyond just tech professionals. For instance, the search term "samba," which once primarily returned results related to software for Unix and Windows interoperability, now predominantly features content about the dance. Two main theories emerge from this discussion: first, there may be a waning interest in computer science-related searches, although this seems unlikely given that university students still seek academic resources online. Second, it is possible that Google is being used more extensively by diverse user groups, diluting the visibility of tech-specific searches. Despite these trends, there is no consensus that computer science is losing popularity as a field.
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When I took a look at Google Trends this morning, I found out that words such as "computer science," "software engineering," "programming," "c++/java" have been declining significantly over the years. Even "outsourcing" has been as well.

Can anyone explain this pattern?
 
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Google is becoming more part of the 'real' world rather than just being used by computer types?
The top hit for 'samba' used to be a program to allow Unix machines to talk to Windows servers now the first dozen pages are probably about the dance.
 
mgb_phys said:
Google is becoming more part of the 'real' world rather than just being used by computer types?
The top hit for 'samba' used to be a program to allow Unix machines to talk to Windows servers now the first dozen pages are probably about the dance.

Hmm, first few links for me
http://www.samba.org/
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samba_(software)
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samba_(disambiguation)
us1.samba.org/samba/what_is_samba.html
us1.samba.org/samba/

5/9 seems significant to me. Even if you don't consider sub-links, it still is 3/6 (Ignoring the video links).

Coming back to the question :

Snippet from About Google Trends
"With Google Trends, you can compare the world’s interest in your favorite topics. Enter up to five topics and see how often they’ve been searched on Google over time."

This gives two possible reasons,
A] Losing interest in CS related searches
This is quite highly unlikely because university students might still search on google for lecture notes and the likes .oO(or do they? especially with sites like academicearth.org, wikipedia, ocw etc. vying to be a more centralized and dependable sources for academic notes and info?)
B] Google is being used equally if not more by all of its user groups than those who would search for CS specific stuffs.

It could either of the above or both. Ofcourse, if someone tries to imply from this that CS is not a popular field anymore, then I must say that I don't feel the same way.

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