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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”

#331

Post by awb »

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.

What? Do you do this in other elements of your life?

“I’m not going to drink this veggie smoothie because they started adding honey and I don’t think sugar is healthy. I’m going to drink soda where at least they don’t try to hide that you’re drinking sugar.”

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

#332

Post by paxys »

bobobob420 wrote: post #215
paxys wrote: post #194

Judging by the replies to this thread, I don't think anyone here knows what an algorithm is. How do you think any search engine on the planet "objectively" decides how to show you the top 10 results for a search term out of billions of possibilities? There are a thousand knobs constantly being turned behind the scenes depending on the preferences of the operator. "Non-biased search results" are impossible by definiti…

And making some stance about what results you should see based on a war that is going on is wrong. If someone searches for a keyword they should get back results that are relevant to the keyword. They should not have results filtered on this impression that those results come from paticular sources that are deemed by DDG as russian propaganda. Search engines are not supposed to filter out propaganda. That propaganda…

And what if the user is not specifically looking for propaganda? If I search for "Ukraine war", the top result can be CNN or Ukraine News or RT. The engine operator has to decide which one of these to show me. What is the objectively correct option according to you?

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

#333

Post by colinmhayes »

moltke wrote: post #300
Imnimo wrote: post #290

Suppose I go off and make a search engine, with my own algorithm for ranking search results. At first it works great. And then five years later, I find that, by a quirk in my algorithm, I find that a new site has risen to the top of all my results. This new site was created as a prank, and it contains authoritative-sounding but incorrect answers to common questions. The results returned are still relevant to my users…

>Should I simply accept that this site is the correct top result for my users' queries, Yes, your users aren't using your search engine as an oracle for the truth, they're using it to find pages with similar text. It's their job (and specifically not yours) to determine how well the text they find corresponds with reality. Perhaps they're even aware the site is factually incorrect and enjoy reading it for the novelty…

> Yes, your users aren't using your search engine as an oracle for the truth, they're using it to find pages with similar text.

The reason google removes factually incorrect results is because this is actually exactly what the vast majority of people use search engines for.

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

#334

Post by skinnymuch »

endymi0n wrote: post #265
AmVess wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Your second paragraph is unnecessary.

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

#335

Post by verve_rat »

gruez wrote: post #313
kube-system wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"unbiased" doesn't mean "unfiltered". For example, I don't want spam or malware in my search results. Search results should return good information that is relevant to your query, and filter out anything that is not that.

> "unbiased" doesn't mean "unfiltered". For example, I don't want spam or malware in my search results. That seems like a cop-out to me. They're not filtering "spam or malware", they're filtering "Russian disinformation". What's next? Maybe OAN is "right-wing disinformation" and we should "filter" that too? What about fox news? How far can you use that excuse to say you're not biased?

> "Russian disinformation"

Which is spam.

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

#336

Post by honkler »

hammock wrote: post #169
uejfiweun wrote: post #3

I like DDG, but honestly, this is a really bad move. It is already harder for me to find certain sites in the rankings. I mean look at this, even searching for "drudge" doesn't even bring up a link to Drudge Report: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=drudge&t=h_&ia=web I liked DDG because it respected the user. Limiting what I can see in order to make sure I don't see "Russian disinformation" seems to me like the exact opposi…

Drudge Report sold out to the deep state, they didn't cover hardly any of the election integrity news at all (among other editorial decisions). The rumor is Matt Drudge doesn't even own it anymore. If you still get your "conservative" news from there I suggest switching to Rantingly.

Thanks for rantingly!

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

#338

Post by helen___keller »

moltke wrote: post #315
helen___keller wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yes, your users aren't using your search engine as an oracle for the truth, they're using it to find pages with similar text. I’m confident this is factually incorrect for a very very large subset of searches. Probably a majority.

It's never going to work for that though. This is like changing a hammer design because some people are hurting themselves using it as a comb.

It does work for that. For a large number of searches, on relatively uncontroversial topics, search engines have effectively become oracles of truth.

This is how google ended up with their modern design that discourages website clicks, they did research into their users and realized most people searching “Abraham Lincoln’s birthday” want to see the top result “February 12, 1809” and not the top result “https://www.loc.gov/item/today-in-history/february-12”

Obviously I’m aware that not all data is uncontroversial and agreed upon, but it’s a fact that a large percentage of searches are quite literally treating search engines as oracles of truth

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

#339

Post by awb »

2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote: post #150
gambler wrote: post #78

You know, I am beginning to see that all that talk about mass psychosis caused by social isolation due to Covid and lockdowns was onto something. It explains a lot of what is happening right now. People are hyper-focused on only one thing and pay zero attention to long-term and larger-context consequences of their actions. And proud of it.

I have no idea what all of the talk about mass psychosis is even trying to say and the video about it that went viral feels a bit...manufactured?

I’m sure there’s a term for it, but it’s saying something that could be true without providing data or any accountability kind of like a horoscope.

“People seem much more X than they did Y years ago.”

The power of suggestion makes you start noticing all the examples of X in the last Y years.

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

#340

Post by ricardo81 »

Imnimo wrote: post #323
ricardo81 wrote: post #297

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> contains authoritative-sounding but incorrect answers to common questions. The results returned are still relevant to my users, but they are now factually incorrect. IMO the difference is between web-wide decisions vs something else. DDG have stated they're specifically targetting something beyond web pages. If DDG has some way of measuring "misinformation" then fair play, we can assume it isn't specific to Russia…

So if I could only detect this one prank site, but did not have a way to detect and downrank all prank sites at once, you would say it's invalid for me to just take action against the one I know about, since that's not a universal solution?

define prank.

dictionary definition (according to Google)

>a practical joke or mischievous act.

Maybe if that's the definition then all Twitter parody accounts need to be removed. Would you agree?

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