"Previous Query Refinement" coming soon to Google 11 Apr 2008

Google's Vice President of Search Products and User Experience, Marissa Mayer, told SMX Sydney about plans to add "Previous Query Refinement" to Google.com. Danny Sullivan explains how this will work:

"If someone were to search for 'spain' and then [perform a new search for] 'travel' after that, BOTH the ads and the organic results will be altered to take the previous query into account. To some degree, it will be as if the second query was for 'spain travel'."

Interesting stuff...We wonder how well this behaviour fits with users' expectations though. The assumption that each new search is a refinement of its predecessors seems dangerous to us. What about when you perform unconnected searches like "Windows XP" and "Football scores"? There's no way you would want to build a gobbledegook query like "Windows XP Football scores" as a result.