The Stream

Have you ever wondered how Google tracks your search result clicks? The technique behind is relatively simple, each link is attached to the mousedown event, currently handled by the rws function. So your search result links look completely normal until you press down the mouse button on them. Google rewrites the URL and redirects through its own website so they are able to track your choices. For instance, search for Google OS returned http://www.osnews.com/story.php?news_id=10096 at the third position, but after the rewrite it became:

I like this elegant solution which is necessary for the Search History and besides it helps Google to better rank the search results.