I tried this 40 word query on Google words and got this warning: "3" (and any subsequent words) was ignored because we limit queries to 32 words. (The "3" was the 33rd word in my query) Click on the above image to see the results.
So they have quietly raised the search limit to 32 words. But why didn't they annouce it officially ? There's no mention in even the Google Blog.
The 32 word limit is used on the main search engine, image search, Froogle, and via the Google search API which you still have to live with the 10 word limitation on Google groups and Google news
There was lot of stuff on Getting Around the 10 Word Limit by replacing unimportant with words with * within quotation marks " ". None worked completely and all had their downsides. Now that Google gives us 32 words as native search feature, hacks like these will be a thing of the past. Of course, you may still need them if you want to stretch your search to cover 33 words.
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