Google killed me
amywilentz.tumblr.com
Google killed me
1–10 of 99 posts
Re: Google killed me
#2Here's the edit history for the page, where you can see all the edits user Amywilentz made over the last few years. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Amy_Wilentz&a...
Re: Google killed me
#3Curiously, a couple of weeks since that post was made, Google have obviously updated their results, I no longer get a "Died:" record when I search for "amy wilentz".
Perhaps another case of Google ignoring you until you get a bit of publicity, or just them finally catching up.
Re: Google killed me
#4Here's the edit history for the page, where you can see all the edits user Amywilentz made over the last few years. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Amy_Wilentz&a...
Those are the edits for Amy Wilentz's page actually.
Her contributions are here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Amywilen...
Re: Google killed me
#5Here's the edit history for the page, where you can see all the edits user Amywilentz made over the last few years. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Amy_Wilentz&a...
It's not too surprising that google dropped the ball. This entry that she describes doesn't even have her birth year shown, but instead lists a dozen other years. That's rather odd for a short bio. Maybe Joel was trying to be polite... never ask a lady her age? https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Amy_Wilentz&o...
>An error in a Google search “factbox” can only be corrected when Google re-indexes (whatever that means) the information that will update the search. Depending on the size of your website, re-indexing takes either a couple of days, or several months. Like good guys, small websites finish last. Note: my website is small.
I think she misunderstands here. If the data is scraped from wikipedia, it really has nothing to do with her site, right?
Re: Google killed me
#6Natural language parsing is not 100% accurate and can make mistakes - breaking news!
All kinds of automated data collection such as this will have errors that need to be fixed manually by a human. This will be taken care of if/when we eventually have real artificial intelligence. The data parsing scripts Google and others use are fairly advanced, but they still break down to a couple rules and finding words in close proximity. There is no real intelligence involved here.
EDIT: The important takeaway here is to make sure we continue to educate people (especially government) as to the issues and unreliability of these systems. Death date showing up on Google isn't a train smash, but if some government agency decides that Google is smarter than them? Then we are in trouble.
Re: Google killed me
#7Natural language parsing is not 100% accurate and can make mistakes - breaking news! All kinds of automated data collection such as this will have errors that need to be fixed manually by a human. This will be taken care of if/when we eventually have real artificial intelligence. The data parsing scripts Google and others use are fairly advanced, but they still break down to a couple rules and finding words in close…
It is interesting that google almost seems to take Wikipedia bio boxes as gospel, which is a questionable decision given that Google "rich snippets" in the search results now have such high placement. I wonder how much Wikipedia specific logic is used in the googlebot...I'm guessing that longevity of article and number of edits is a factor in taking an entry seriously.
Re: Google killed me
#8Natural language parsing is not 100% accurate and can make mistakes - breaking news! All kinds of automated data collection such as this will have errors that need to be fixed manually by a human. This will be taken care of if/when we eventually have real artificial intelligence. The data parsing scripts Google and others use are fairly advanced, but they still break down to a couple rules and finding words in close…
I'm reading Jaron Lanier's _You Are Not a Gadget_ now (came out two years ago), and the phrase "but if some government agency decides that Google is smarter than them?" resonates. A major insight of this book is that, in fact, the dominant technological ideology does advance the idea that Google and Wikipedia are smarter than actual people. And we are, in fact, in deep trouble because of this.
Re: Google killed me
#9Natural language parsing is not 100% accurate and can make mistakes - breaking news! All kinds of automated data collection such as this will have errors that need to be fixed manually by a human. This will be taken care of if/when we eventually have real artificial intelligence. The data parsing scripts Google and others use are fairly advanced, but they still break down to a couple rules and finding words in close…
It is interesting that google almost seems to take Wikipedia bio boxes as gospel, which is a questionable decision given that Google "rich snippets" in the search results now have such high placement. I wonder how much Wikipedia specific logic is used in the googlebot...I'm guessing that longevity of article and number of edits is a factor in taking an entry seriously.
> It is interesting that google almost seems to take Wikipedia bio boxes as gospel
FTA, I don't believe the data was taken from a bio box:
> So it’s not too surprising that my original Wikipedia entry, as conceived by Joel, was — let’s be honest — more about my father (a famous New Jersey judge) than about me. Joel began the entry with my connection to my father, and immediately mentioned my father’s birthdate and the date of his death.
That's the scary part, as she alludes to in the next paragraph:
> If your name on Wikipedia is followed by a birth and death date, apparently those belong to you from that day forward, no matter whose dates they may be.
Re: Google killed me
#10[deleted]