If the information you're searching for would have been in the next page, searching within the page would have been similarly "broken" in a paginated UI.
The alternative to infinite scrolling isn't to load infinite data up front.
The alternative to infinite scrolling isn't to load infinite data up front.
The only difference really is that infinite load almost guarantees the page won’t have what you want on it, when you visit it.
And with my first problem, I can use the Next buttom and Ctrl+F (features others on this thread mentioned).
Infinite load is not the right answer everywhere (anywhere?)
Eg: What if StackOverflow adopted it?
Lazy loading implies the opposite? Regardless, it being broken up is very useful for everything around the site usage. IE google-linking, sharing urls, bookmarking, etc.
Infinite scroll is an optimization for first-time usage of a site, or for pages that are naturally read-once (ie twitter feed). They break everything surrounding n-use of the page.