Google Search: Manage Blocked Sites

I've been using Google search since 1999, and have felt that they've dummied down the search results somewhat in the last few years.  Instead of searching for exact search terms, they've include words that they assume you meant to search for, requiring you to put a "-" in front of it to exclude the term.  But in the last few weeks they've added probably the most significant improvement to search in the last ten years.  You can now exclude sites from search results.  On the "manage blocked sites" tab, you can manually add blocked sites to your results.  As an example, assume you are searching a name to see if the person is still at a company.  While your search would return Linkedin results (a good thing), you'd also see results from plaxo, jigsaw, spokeo, mylife, etc.  I consider these sites to be of poor quality, so now I can remove them.  It cuts down search time significantly and provides more accurate results.  Whoever implemented this at Google deserves a raise.