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We didn’t lose control of the Web – it was stolen

ar.al

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Re: We didn’t lose control of the Web – it was stolen

#131

Post by notlisted »

notlisted wrote: post #97

FB did steal the web and your social network. Remember how FB grew? If not, let me remind you: "See which of your friends are also on FB! Just give us your Google and Yahoo contacts". Yes, you gave FB permission to check your contacts, but FB omitted to tell us that they would be HOLDING ON to your contacts forever and ever. FB then sent those contacts, without your permission and not per your request, an email sayin…

Follow-up: To see which contacts you have uploaded (and to delete those) see: https://www.facebook.com/invite_history.php

Similarly, there's a page for messenger too (with the tip that you can turn off continuous uploading): https://www.facebook.com/mobile/messenger/contacts/

Re: We didn’t lose control of the Web – it was stolen

#132

Post by ashark »

exDM69 wrote: post #120
hugh4life wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google is a lot less useful than it used to be... Google getting rid of blog search, forum search, and google reader has done as much as facebook to silo-ize the web.

In my opinion, Google stopped being a "search engine" roughly 10 years ago. These days I'd call it a "recommendation engine" and it seems to primarily work by giving you results that people similar to your profile (according to the tracking surveillance data they have) have clicked with keywords similar to your query. Not that I necessarily blame them, all the SEO and blogspam crap made searching the web with somethi…

> Not that I necessarily blame them, all the SEO and blogspam crap made searching the web with something similar to pagerank and impossibility a long time ago. I think the eulogy was served by the "miserable failure" thing when GWB was elected (it was called a "Google bomb" in the media). That and all the low-effort wikipedia copies with their advertising made it impossible.

They use to fight the spam, though, and you could still find obscure-but-relevant sites. Not 99% of searches are, at best, a few top results from the same handful of sites that always seem to top the results, then a sea of spam. They seem to have just given up and ranked hard toward the top traffic sites and let the spam sites simply have the entire middle of the search rankings, starting around '08 or so. If you manage to search for something that's not on the couple hundred top sites, you end up with nothing but spam.

Re: We didn’t lose control of the Web – it was stolen

#133

Post by ashark »

ams6110 wrote: post #126

The original, open, non-privacy-invading web is still there. There are many sites sharing and hyperlinking academic research and relevant practitioner information that do not have advertising and do not track you. We are the ones who voted with our clicks to use the likes of LinkedIn, Facebook, and Google.

Is there some kind of search engine that limits itself to the "ancient"-style web, as it existed from its beginning to ~10-12 years ago, though not necessarily confined to older sites when newer ones fit the style and content of that period?

I'd use the hell out of something like that. I'd take enthusiastic amateurs with their web-rings and guest books, and academic sites over the modern advertising-centric web any day. Very little of that bubbles to the top of searches as it is (Wikipedia being easily the most prominent).

Re: We didn’t lose control of the Web – it was stolen

#134

Post by ashark »

fny wrote: post #65
quadrangle wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds like just-world fallacy. There's plenty of examples of people who take actions that do not lead to desirable outcomes. The idea that people choosing something in itself proves its value is nonsense.

I should have been clearer. I'm terrified of the power corporation's have amassed through surveillance, but no one I know outside of the tech community sees a problem. Most see Google and Facebook as "benevolent overlords"[0]. How can we convince people that danger lurks in the future given their love affair with the free, life-changing services of the "benevolent?" [0]: Quote from my roommate at Duke: "I, for one, w…

I'd bet the majority of people have no clue exactly how much data they collect, how much other info they're able to derive from that, and what they do with it. If you described what they're actually doing as a hypothetical, I bet many of those people would assume it's already illegal, because much of it sure smells like something that ought to be illegal.

Re: We didn’t lose control of the Web – it was stolen

#135

Post by bambax »

sosodaft wrote: post #110
bambax wrote: post #79

While I agree with the gist of the article, I have a problem conflating Google and Facebook in the same evil bag. Facebook is the evilest of evil, not only for the reasons stated, but also because information entered into Facebook never comes out. You have to have an account on FB to see anything on the platform. That is contrary to everything the Web ever stood for. Since I don't have a Facebook account, most of my…

Alphabet as innocuous is ridiculous. Guess their elementary school name and bright primary colors are working. You realize that your search results are topped by people who pay Google right? That they use your browsing activity to sell things to you just like everyone else?

> You realize that your search results are topped by people who pay Google right?

What do you mean? Do you mean ads? Or do you mean "natural" results are influenced by people who buy ads?

I almost never see any ad because I use uBlock both on the desktop (90% of my browsing time) and on Firefox Android.

I really don't think there's a connection between buying ads and getting top ranks on "natural" results; I could be wrong about that but I would need proof, not a simple assertion.

Re: We didn’t lose control of the Web – it was stolen

#136

Post by mattmanser »

literallycancer wrote: post #105
mattmanser wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Try turning off any of the incredibly invasive features in Android. If you try to turn off constant location, for example, maps starts throwing all sort of cryptic messages at you. You can't use google play without an account. They want to get you to log into Chrome so they can hook up your desktop searches to your mobile searches and profile you. If you've ever used Ok Google, every word you've ever said to it is re…

I actually like what they started doing lately, where the answer to my query is extracted from the page, and shown at the top of the results, especially when it's something simple that I just want to double check. When's sunset today?, what was the name of that movie with surgeon turned spell caster?, how long does it take to go from A to B? Another way to say XYZ? Too many sites are full of crap, so this saves me a…

You're alright with stealing someone else's work and passing it off as your own, while making money doing it?

OK.

Re: We didn’t lose control of the Web – it was stolen

#137

Post by [deleted] »

literallycancer wrote: post #105
mattmanser wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Try turning off any of the incredibly invasive features in Android. If you try to turn off constant location, for example, maps starts throwing all sort of cryptic messages at you. You can't use google play without an account. They want to get you to log into Chrome so they can hook up your desktop searches to your mobile searches and profile you. If you've ever used Ok Google, every word you've ever said to it is re…

I actually like what they started doing lately, where the answer to my query is extracted from the page, and shown at the top of the results, especially when it's something simple that I just want to double check. When's sunset today?, what was the name of that movie with surgeon turned spell caster?, how long does it take to go from A to B? Another way to say XYZ? Too many sites are full of crap, so this saves me a…

[deleted]

Re: We didn’t lose control of the Web – it was stolen

#138

Post by ethics_gradient »

exDM69 wrote: post #120
hugh4life wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google is a lot less useful than it used to be... Google getting rid of blog search, forum search, and google reader has done as much as facebook to silo-ize the web.

In my opinion, Google stopped being a "search engine" roughly 10 years ago. These days I'd call it a "recommendation engine" and it seems to primarily work by giving you results that people similar to your profile (according to the tracking surveillance data they have) have clicked with keywords similar to your query. Not that I necessarily blame them, all the SEO and blogspam crap made searching the web with somethi…

Do you need the results to be personified? I use DDG / startpage to avoid it.

Re: We didn’t lose control of the Web – it was stolen

#139

Post by ethics_gradient »

blub wrote: post #68
subjectsigma wrote: post #21

I agree with the sentiment of this article, but only to a degree. I recommend anyone interested in this to read Open Standards and the Digital Age, by Andrew Russel. The book is a partial refutation of the idea of an 'open web' using historical examples, the most shocking being the failure of open and democratic methods to build an open Internet standard versus the success of Serf and Kahn inventing TCP/IP in a close…

You agree with the sentiment of the article but then you're muddying the waters and shifting the discussion from Big Data companies like Google and Facebook to some abstract ideal of freedom and openness. The only "misleading language" that I see here belongs to you. The author is very clear about what disease has infected software development and the internet. I don't remember many spyware as a service and data coll…

I concur. Parent's post was interesting, but if we narrow down to datamining and surveillance, it has gotten a whole lot worse to a degree that is beyond appreciable.

Re: We didn’t lose control of the Web – it was stolen

#140

Post by geebee »

VA3FXP wrote: post #127
TheSpiceIsLife wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Never underestimate the ability of people to romanticise a past that never existed.

This quote is going to be immortalized. It is succinct, and perfectly reflects a real problem with the human condition. Thank-you.

The problem with succinct and clever phrases is that they can be used to shut down discussion of important issues.

It's such a great reply that people may, not wishing to appear to be one of these naive souls who romanticize a past that never existed, refrain from pointing out that it is possible to lose things from the past that did exist and were exceptionally valuable. It's even possible to have these things stolen from you.

Yes, it is certainly possible to romanticize a past that never existed. Also: the web is less open than it used to be, and Facebook had plenty to do with it.

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