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Boris Johnson uses search terms in interviews to hide negative articles?

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Re: Boris Johnson uses search terms in interviews to hide negative articles?

#111

Post by cameronbrown »

scarygliders wrote: post #95
nbevans wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It isn't "spiritually" true. It is factually true to the extent that the High Court ruled 350m was approximately the correct gross figure. Indeed some say that figure is conservative because it was based on projections from an official figure dated from 2014 that put the gross at closer to 450m. I'm guessing 2014 was high because of financial bailouts still being paid into the EU coffers. From the ruling statement: “…

Isn't it strange that any and all seemingly pro-Brexit posts here are being downvoted. What you posted is factually correct. From observation, HN has turned into just another Slashdot, unfortunately. I came here to escape from Slashdot's obvious liberal-biased bubble, but the infestation has happened here too. No doubt this post will be downvoted into oblivion as well, including the other replie(s) I've made on this…

I've had some reasonable conversations on the topic here but I do feel it in downvotes (which I'm not interested in anyway)

Re: Boris Johnson uses search terms in interviews to hide negative articles?

#112

Post by sorokod »

afarrell wrote: post #50
rusk wrote: post #5

> I wonder why nobody else is willing to do this? Because it makes you look like a fool. Doesn’t mean it won’t work though. Bojo apparently targetting the segment for whom this kind thing goes over their heads

Because empirically, it doesn't work. The front page of google for [Boris Johnson bus] has stories about: - The failure of a busmaker - The brexit bus advert - The suspicion that his 'model bus' answer was this ploy.

It is likely that Google is surfacing the matches it empirically considers more relevant to you.

Re: Boris Johnson uses search terms in interviews to hide negative articles?

#113

Post by mmahemoff »

akerro wrote: post #76
olivierduval wrote: post #38

The most worrying for me? Even after countless updates to their algorithms, breakthrough AI and ML, breaking hundred of thousands of legit website each time, Google is still dumb enough to be tricked by such a simplistic tactics :-( Or is Google biased toward "official" speech (even from a really-not-trustable source) like Twitter is when it will allow BS from a President (because it's an official account so not subj…

> breaking hundred of thousands of legit website each time, Google is still dumb enough to be tricked by such a simplistic tactics Google wasn't tricked, it's intentional. Their business model is generating money from clicks. It's not showing you best results for what you search for. It's showing latest news, tragedy, and what people talk about. 10h old news? OLD, BORING. New shiny 2h young news? YEA, more clicks, cl…

Good point that there can be misaligned incentives between searcher and search engine.

Is it really the case here though?

Most people would be running this search because they heard about the story elsewhere, so they will consider the search engine less useful when they see a completely different (non-)story.

If it was a bizarre tale about a prime minister making bus models, maybe, but "Politician praises himself, more news at 11" in place of a story hours earlier doesn't appear to help Google.

Re: Boris Johnson uses search terms in interviews to hide negative articles?

#114

Post by barry-cotter »

drbw wrote: post #68
SmellyGeekBoy wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed. The "lovable bumbling fool" image he puts across is a very conscious choice on his part. Despite what you think about his politics (and I'm personally not a fan) you can't deny that Johnson is much smarter than he wants us to think.

Maybe, but he's always been lazy and unwilling to do much actual work, apparently [1] his headmaster wrote to his father in 1982: Boris really has adopted a disgracefully cavalier attitude to his classical studies... Boris sometimes seems affronted when criticised for what amounts to a gross failure of responsibility (and surprised at the same time that he was not appointed Captain of the School for next half): I thi…

No one gets to be a Telegraph columnist without doing a ton of work, never mind Prime Minster of the UK. Being unwilling to do work purely on other people’s say so is a separate trait from being lazy. He also has a much better command of Ancient Greek than anyone unwilling to apply themselves could acquire however wonderful the teachers the were exposed to.

This is quite apart from the question of whether he’s a buffoon. If anyone but Corbyn was in charge of Labour the Conservatives would be cruising to a large electoral defeat soon but we don’t live in that world.

Re: Boris Johnson uses search terms in interviews to hide negative articles?

#115

Post by gmueckl »

vfc1 wrote: post #109
sincerely wrote: post #3

This is actually fascinating (even if it may not be the behavior we expect from our elected leaders). He did the same thing in June where he gave a completely baffling interview [1] about how his hobby was painting models of buses out of used fruit crates. But people suspected [2] then that it might be a similar strategy, to monopolize the results for "boris johnson bus" searches. I wonder why nobody else is willing…

There is a much simpler explanation. It's actually these cheap news websites engineering articles targetting Boris Johnson popular terms (like Model or Bus), in order to generate clicks and advertising revenue.

But Johnson still seems to deliver suitable quotes on cue. As much as I prefer explanations that involve less assumed cooperarion between actors, I don't see how yours can hold up in this case.

Re: Boris Johnson uses search terms in interviews to hide negative articles?

#118

Post by majjam »

k3liutZu wrote: post #49
petargyurov wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> its results are such garbage Whenever people complain about DDG's search results I am always a bit baffled. It works 95% of the time for me and that 5% is occurs when I am searching for the answer to some obscure bug. I know this is your word against mine but "garbage" is a bit of an exaggeration.

> 5% is occurs when I am searching for the answer to some obscure bug I think these are a majority of my searches, hence I had to switch back to google as DDG was almost never finding me any relevant result.

You don't just use the bangs (g!)? Or is that what you mean by switching back?

Re: Boris Johnson uses search terms in interviews to hide negative articles?

#119

Post by viraptor »

SmellyGeekBoy wrote: post #33
AznHisoka wrote: post #29

My respect level for Boris actually went up a few notches after reading about this :)

Indeed. The "lovable bumbling fool" image he puts across is a very conscious choice on his part. Despite what you think about his politics (and I'm personally not a fan) you can't deny that Johnson is much smarter than he wants us to think.

In this case we don't even know if it was his idea. For all we know he's paying a lot of money to a really good PR company.

Re: Boris Johnson uses search terms in interviews to hide negative articles?

#120

Post by IAmGraydon »

scarygliders wrote: post #95
nbevans wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It isn't "spiritually" true. It is factually true to the extent that the High Court ruled 350m was approximately the correct gross figure. Indeed some say that figure is conservative because it was based on projections from an official figure dated from 2014 that put the gross at closer to 450m. I'm guessing 2014 was high because of financial bailouts still being paid into the EU coffers. From the ruling statement: “…

Isn't it strange that any and all seemingly pro-Brexit posts here are being downvoted. What you posted is factually correct. From observation, HN has turned into just another Slashdot, unfortunately. I came here to escape from Slashdot's obvious liberal-biased bubble, but the infestation has happened here too. No doubt this post will be downvoted into oblivion as well, including the other replie(s) I've made on this…

No - it isn’t strange. This is Hacker News. We are here to talk about the technical aspects of the alleged search manipulation, not your political beliefs. It’s well known that political opinion isn’t on the table for discussion here. If you want that kind of discourse, check out the politics subreddit, where you will find oodles of children spouting their uninformed political opinions.
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