This feels like a cat and mouse game. Google has blocked results, Google drops blocked results, Google adds starring results, Google drops starring results. Google is known to constantly test new user interfaces and swap them out for new and even old tests after determining they are unhappy with how searchers interact with those changes.
Remember when Google added stars to replace SearchWiki? Well, as you know, Google just brought back the block sites feature from 2005 and thus felt they can now remove the "stars" feature, which they did sometime recently.
Here is a screen shot showing starred results in Google, but also showing how I can't star new results directly in Google.
The only way to "star" results is to use Google Bookmarks.
I should note, the stars will still show for your Google Bookmarks, but you can no longer "star" or "bookmark" results directly from the Google Search results pages.
Laudy from Google commented on this in two Google Web Search Help threads after complaints that the star feature was missing came up. Laudy said:
This feature no longer exists on Google. Stars worked as a bookmark function which still exists at google.com/bookmarks. Here you will see all your starred items, and any of your old starred features will be there too.Heres some more details on bookmarks.
Thanks for asking
Are you upset Google dropped stars from Google.com?
Forum discussion at Google Web Search Help.
Postscript: A Google spokesperson sent us a statement:
Results you've already starred or bookmarked will continue to appear with stars in your search results. You can also still bookmark pages using the Google Toolbar or by visiting google.com/bookmarks. However, we are in the process of updating our bookmarking features so the ability to star new sites on the results page is currently unavailable.
