Google Keyboard Navigation: I Loathe You

Google has done a lot for the web and the internet. They are pioneers in so many things, that I probably can't remember them all off the top of my head. While Google has made many things I love (Google Search, Gmail, Google Chrome), many things I feel indifferent about (Google Docs, Google Desktop, Blogger), and many things I don't have a use for (Google Health, Google Earth, Google Voice), I have never hated anything they have made.

Seeing how I mentioned hating something by Google, you can probably guess that I finally hate something they've done.

Google released Google Instant recently, which instantly updates the Google results page as you type. I love it, I think it neat, cool, groovy. Then, to make it "easier" to use, they updated the results page with keyboard navigation. With keyboard navigation, when you hit up or down on the arrow keys, you arrow through the results, kind of like selecting something from a menu with arrow keys (video above).

This is supposed to help you, but for me, it's awkward, jarring, and not what I expect when I hit the arrow keys. If you use the arrow keys often when browsing the web, like me, you should be familiar with their standard function of scrolling. You should be able to scroll on my blog, trying hitting the up and down arrow keys now. See that scrolling action? I bet you can understand how frustrating it is when that doesn't work when searching Google.

Google, please remove keyboard navigation and let me scroll using arrow keys, like every other webpage on the internet.