I tend to find this more infuriating than useful; to google for the result of a two-month computation that you thought was new and exciting and to get a hit does not fill me with the most ecstatic kind of well-fermented joy.
If you want well-fermented joy, you should try an off-licence rather than Google!
But yes, I can imagine that would be less fun. I get a similar effect (though typically preceded by rather fewer months of work) when I think of a clever pun, google for it, and find I'm only the second or fifth or tenth person to think of it. (If everybody had thought of it before, that's less frustrating, for some reason; the pessimal thing is to be the second.) I suppose it's the difference between googling for something hoping it's new, and googling for it hoping it's not.
(If everybody had thought of it before, that's less frustrating, for some reason; the pessimal thing is to be the second.)
I suspect that's because if you're the second, then you've just missed out on a clever idea, whereas if 10^8 other people have thought of it, then it's a human universal that comes to everyone.
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But yes, I can imagine that would be less fun. I get a similar effect (though typically preceded by rather fewer months of work) when I think of a clever pun, google for it, and find I'm only the second or fifth or tenth person to think of it. (If everybody had thought of it before, that's less frustrating, for some reason; the pessimal thing is to be the second.) I suppose it's the difference between googling for something hoping it's new, and googling for it hoping it's not.
I suspect that's because if you're the second, then you've just missed out on a clever idea, whereas if 10^8 other people have thought of it, then it's a human universal that comes to everyone.