I don't think I explained the hitman thing very well - I was trying to show what you are saying. You can't conclude that lots of people are trying to hire a hitman just because Google autosuggests the phrase - in the same way that you can't conclude a brand is a scam just because Google says so.

I saw the link to this article on 90percentofeverything.com

I see where you are going with the point you are making, and of course we mustn't believe what Google tells us, in the same way that we mustn't believe what the media - or even our friends - tell us, without checking the evidence.

However, I believe your argument has a logical flaw.

You rightly state that "credit expert" is a more common search than "creditexpert", however quantity of searches is not the only factor to assess in search data analysis; the quality of search intent is also relevant. You haven't touched on the correlation between search intent and the search terms people use.

Searches for "creditexpert" are presumably many times more likely to represent a search intent for the specific service provided by UK company Experian called "Creditexpert" (all one word) than searches for "credit expert", which implies a completely ambiguous search intent (and one for which the pool of searches is far larger, geographically speaking).

Let's assume that people who want to find Experian CreditExpert type either "credit expert" OR "creditexpert" into the search engine. If you had to choose one of these terms on which to base an analysis, which one should you therefore choose?

Lesson: a larger sample size doesn't always provide more meaningful results.

Also I feel you have completely misinterpreted the implied search intention with your statement about the Google search "Where can I hire a hitman". Firstly this doesn't necessarily mean the searcher is looking for a hitman, from which you can conclude that lots of people actually want to hire a hitman (this is what you implied it meant in your article) - it could mean they are looking for the reference in a script of a very popular film, for example. Secondly, and more interestingly from a position of global liability law, who says that this search suggestion *should* reflect the search intention of the user? Why should Google not be allowed as an independent company to skew search results by suggesting things to users that they may not want, for the sake of amusement or interest? No - it's not great if you do want to hire a hitman, but that's the way the web works: learning through distraction.

I do however agree with your point that online brand degeneration can become a self-fulfilling prophecy when things are suggested to users. But Google is an independent company working in a market; who says they have a moral responsibility to provide users with some form of absolute truth?

Interesting article nonetheless.