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DuckDuckGo “down-rank sites associated with Russian disinformation”

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Re: DuckDuckGo “down-rank sites associated with Russian disinformation”

#261

Post by 13415 »

_vufv wrote: post #209

How arogant do you have to be to consider yourself to be the arbiter of Truth? Do you really think that western media are propaganda free? Do you think that the western propaganda is good and Russian one is bad? If you're downranking disinformation from Russian side, shouldn't you also downrank western disinformation? Does your assesment of truthfulness really boil-down to "in-group good / out-group bad"? If yes, why…

The very idea of a search engine is to filter a few useful pages out hundreds of thousands of pages. It's impossible to do that without bias and it's bizarre to think Russian disinformation sites could provide useful information. Not even Russians think that. The search engine should give the respective results when the user enters "Russian disinformation sites" or something like that, of course.

On a side note, during the past two weeks Russian disinformation campaigns have become so awfully retarded that it's not even funny to browse them for entertainment anymore. It's just obvious bullshit, changing the tune daily because FSB agents no longer know what to say.

Re: DuckDuckGo “down-rank sites associated with Russian disinformation”

#262

Post by marcosdumay »

twofornone wrote: post #154
marcosdumay wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No it doesn't. What creates filter bubbles is ranking sites differently for each person, what has no relation at all with the criteria you use on your rank. Personally, I use DDG because it's useful. As long as the new ranking makes them more useful, more power to them. If they do it wrong, I'll start looking for some replacement. If Google did that (as they do) it would require some discussion about censorship and m…

>No it doesn't. What creates filter bubbles is ranking sites differently for each person, what has no relation at all with the criteria you use on your rank That's assuming there's only one platform. When users can choose other search engines (or social media sites, video platforms, etc) then it absolutely creates a filter bubble when each platform injects its own bias into its content. No algorithm is perfect but I'…

The case of different platforms is not a filter bubble. It's just a social bubble like it always existed.

The fundamental feature of a filter bubble is that you can not escape it. If all it takes is looking at another site, it's not it.

Anyway, I prefer my search results devoid of known falsehoods. I don't believe it at all that DDG can achieve this, but if there's a loud known source of that can be cut without false positives, I do prefer that it's cut. Unfortunately, verifying the mainstream news isn't such an easy task, so that DDG will become both more reliable and more biased at the same time. Personally, I don't care much for the bias. I care about the reliability.

(And yes, all of your conclusions are probably true.)

Re: DuckDuckGo “down-rank sites associated with Russian disinformation”

#263

Post by LeoPanthera »

hammock wrote: post #94

There's really nowhere reliable on the web you can get non-Western sanctioned news about the Russia-Ukraine conflict. If you are interested in alternative viewpoints, don't bother with any of the search engines. All the sources I've seen are on, e.g. Telegram.

This is an odd viewpoint. To me, "news" means "what is happening". I'm aware that the American news media does tend to mix a fairly heavy dose of opinion into that, but that isn't your only choice. The wire services like AP, or non-US news organizations like the BBC or Japan's NHK provide alternatives.

But these aren't "alternative viewpoints". They're just news with less opinion. Are you actually looking for news? Or different opinions?

Re: DuckDuckGo “down-rank sites associated with Russian disinformation”

#264

Post by larvaetron »

if_by_whisky wrote: post #178
larvaetron wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> there's a lot of "anti censorship" warriors in this thread You say that as if being "anti censorship" is a weird, or bad thing. What reasonable person would agree that being "pro censorship" is an ideal stance?

Anti-spam utilities exist to filter out (aka "censor") spam. Disinformation is spam. I'm pro filtering spam and perhaps even a reasonable person. There you have it.

> Disinformation is spam.

I believe, at a fundamental level, this statement is far too ambiguous to be considered a reasonable conclusion.

Re: DuckDuckGo “down-rank sites associated with Russian disinformation”

#265

Post by endymi0n »

AmVess wrote: post #201
mrjangles wrote: post #20

Seriously what the f*ck makes Gabriel Weinberg think that myself, or anyone else, gives a damn about his personal opinion on what I should and should not be reading. The arrogance of these people is astounding. Also, absolutely zero of the standard base of Duck Duck Go users are the kind of people who don't understand what a Russian state controlled news site is, and why one would have to be careful reading it. Those…

They just murdered any goodwill they had built up. I just switched to Yandex (Russian search). At least Yandex doesn't pretend to be something that it isn't.

So you think it‘s better to use a search engine openly spewing propaganda than one that tries to curb it?

It sounds like the Putin fans who seem to like him „because he‘s a strong willed man who does not change his mind“ as if that was some kind of qualification.

Re: DuckDuckGo “down-rank sites associated with Russian disinformation”

#266

Post by Spivak »

mattwilsonn888 wrote: post #248
diputsmonro wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is propaganda a "genuine result"? Yeah yeah, one person's truth is another person's propaganda and sometimes the lines are blurry. But cases like RT are pretty clear cut. Sometimes people actually do lie, and those lies are verifiable. Verifiable lies, and the sources who create them predictably and consistently, should not be considered a "genuine result" for a query regarding things that are happening right now. Pr…

Intelligent people are better off not patronized - and fighting disinformation through censorship rather than rebuttal is a pathetic reflection on the state of society. This type of censorship makes it harder for intelligent people to make clear rebuttals and reinforces a culture of tarring people taking the first step of looking into the other side for this purpose.

This is always the line but it ignores that it's more vastly more effort to correct disinformation and propaganda than it is to spew it. Don't patronize intelligent people by making them have to spend literally their entire day having to fight this garbage rather than doing useful work.

Re: DuckDuckGo “down-rank sites associated with Russian disinformation”

#267

Post by avgcorrection »

noyeastguy wrote: post #75

I support this as an avid DDG user. Russian disinformation is a new kind of warfare that we've not inoculated ourselves against yet. This is a step in that direction. “in order to maintain a tolerant society, the society must be intolerant of intolerance.”

I don’t see how that quote applies at all.

Intolerance is something like Nazism. That’s an ideology, not information/disinformation. You can’t disprove an ideology.

Take Russia’s falsehood that the war is a “special military operation”. This is a statement which is neither tolerant nor intolerant. We can clearly see that Russia has launched a full-scale operation against Ukraine, that it is unprovoked, and thus that it is illegal. So we can conclude that “special military operation” is disinformation; just a euphemism for a crime.

A tolerant society can deal with falsehoods just fine.

Re: DuckDuckGo “down-rank sites associated with Russian disinformation”

#268

Post by 2-718-281-828 »

DDG is already censoring. You won't f.x. find sanctioned-suicide.org when searching for "sanctioned suicide". But you can search that forum via the site keyword. Google completely removed that forum from its results.

It's hard to say - I suppose - what that tweet means practically. F.x. searching for "ukraine bio weapon laboratories". Will there be any sites discussing this without just dismissing it? And if yes, how deep are they buried? (https://twitter.com/i/status/1501306485183295488)

Re: DuckDuckGo “down-rank sites associated with Russian disinformation”

#269

Post by kmlx »

sdoering wrote: post #103
hnuser847 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In case someone hasn't noticed, there is a war going on in Europe. That is a circumstance where some of these cases apply. Indeed, there's a war going on and there's a tremendous amount of propaganda being circulated from both sides. The question is, why is DDG okay with amplifying Ukranian/NATO propaganda and not Russian propaganda? Is it because NATO is the "good" guy and Russia is the "bad" guy? When the US inva…

I can't agree more. As a child I was brainwashed by US propaganda living on the western side of the Iron Curtain. The 'home of the brave and land of the free'. How lo g it took me to remove this naive Hollywood image of our friend the US from my mind. It took many long evenings of talking to actual people from the US while in university to learn more about the individual truths and lives instead of my rose tinted ima…

> Russian propaganda is more or less banned from German viewers (with RT and others being banned).

is rt.com also banned?

Re: DuckDuckGo “down-rank sites associated with Russian disinformation”

#270

Post by avgcorrection »

Tainnor wrote: post #213
avgcorrection wrote: post #118

The war is two weeks old and some people seem to want to inject the news from Ukraine straight into their veins. That also makes it easier for disinformation and propaganda to spread. Both sides have an incentive to spread propaganda (although moreso for Russia since this is not a righteous war on their part by any stretch of the imagination). The Wikipedia page for the Ghost of Kyiv currently says that some sources…

Most Western media that I follow are very quick to point out that information from Ukraine is not necessarily trustworthy. They're quite likely to portray the situation in a way that makes it look like they're winning. The number of reported Russian casualties is very likely to be exaggerated and this is pointed out rather consistently.

My own state media frequently figure Zelinsky’s words on the front page/quoted on the news. Passed on uncritically.
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