Direct URLs in Google search results have been replaced with redirect URLs in the form of www.google.com/goto?url=<opaque base64 string>.

The base64 data appears to consist of a very basic protobuf structure, containing a long string of bytes in field 2 which presumably identify the URL.

Sometimes, these redirect URLs take a perceivable amount of time to load, which is very irritating.

> Sometimes, these redirect URLs take a perceivable amount of time to load, which is very irritating.

Great. On top of my on-going battle with Windows + Firefox + DNS/TLS resolution sometimes stalling for seconds at a time, another few second server-side stall is introduced.

I swear that every day modern computing scenarios get slower and slower instead of snappier and snappier.

The link you followed when you clicked hasn't a direct link for years, decade afaik (they mangle so they can see what's followed). The page used to show the direct on the search text but now it shows some stand in for it - sometimes. You can see the direct link on the bottom of the screen when you hover - sometimes (and sometimes you see a mangled link). Sometimes the google link contains the original link in the center also[1].

The situation seems to vary from result to result even on the same page of the same search - at least on the test search I just did. You can figure out what happening to an extent but this very inconsistency seems to speak to a dystopian quality to today's information gatekeepers.

[1] Example. https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=8997844...