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Person Finder: Boston Marathon Explosions

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Re: Person Finder: Boston Marathon Explosions

#21

Post by shrikant »

sukuriant wrote: post #19
jiggy2011 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are no ads on that page.

Very true; and I trust that Google would have a heart to not do that. At least, I hope they wouldn't. My point was that if a for-profit company enters this space, they need a way to monetize their efforts, and it's a field ripe for exploitation. It's better if a non-profit does this, since their heart is more likely to be in the right place.

From Wikipedia: "Google.org is the charitable arm of Internet search engine company Google.

The organization has committed over $100 million in investments and grants as of May 2010."

As much as I like to rag on Google for their lip-service to "don't be evil", this isn't such a case. I don't think Google.org has a [direct] profit motive.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google.org

Re: Person Finder: Boston Marathon Explosions

#22

Post by [deleted] »

lemma wrote: post #20
sukuriant wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because having ads for making funerals less expensive is exactly what I want to see when I'm searching for my loved ones that disappeared during an earthquake. I'd rather not-for-profits continue disaster relief, like they have been, and the for-profits actively choosing to donate to them.

The link is to google.org, google's not-for-profit arm.

[deleted]

Re: Person Finder: Boston Marathon Explosions

#23

Post by sukuriant »

lemma wrote: post #20
sukuriant wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because having ads for making funerals less expensive is exactly what I want to see when I'm searching for my loved ones that disappeared during an earthquake. I'd rather not-for-profits continue disaster relief, like they have been, and the for-profits actively choosing to donate to them.

The link is to google.org, google's not-for-profit arm.

Is there actually a difference between google.com and google.org? I sincerely figured that Google, wanting to not be confused or have their domain offended (whitehouse.com anyone? You couldn't go to that link back in the 90's).

Edit: reading shrikant's response elsewhere, it appears that there is quite a difference. That is very cool, then :)

Re: Person Finder: Boston Marathon Explosions

#24

Post by jmillikin »

nnutter wrote: post #15
toomuchtodo wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or let Google do it. Google can scale much faster than the Red Cross can outsource it.

Until Google decides to close it a few years from now in order to focus on what matters.

There is no need to run a person finder for longer than the duration of the disaster.

Re: Person Finder: Boston Marathon Explosions

#25

Post by magicalist »

nnutter wrote: post #15
toomuchtodo wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or let Google do it. Google can scale much faster than the Red Cross can outsource it.

Until Google decides to close it a few years from now in order to focus on what matters.

Google's Person Finder is open source[1] and uses the People Finder Interchange Format[2], which was designed after Katrina specifically so that disaster relief organizations can quickly share this data so that data sources stay in sync and new ones can be quickly revved up (if traffic overwhelms some or, I don't know, a company decides to no longer host one).

Federation of this data is the most important aspect of it, because people use many different sources for news and information, and should not have to search for every possible database of missing persons to find the information they need. For example, after the 2010 Haitian Earthquake, CNN, the New York Times, the Miami Herald, and the Google Person Finder all shared data[3] so that if any one (or several) went down, all that information was still available from other sources.

In any case, I don't know if you were trying to score free internet points or just being snarky, but it's generally a good idea to do basic research before repeating non sequiturs.

[1] https://code.google.com/p/googlepersonfinder/

[2] http://zesty.ca/pfif/1.4/

[3] http://www.poynter.org/latest-news/top-stories/100245/google...

Re: Person Finder: Boston Marathon Explosions

#26

Post by emddudley »

DanielStraight wrote: post #2

The Red Cross already does this. It's called Safe And Well. This is one place where we definitely don't need fragmentation. If you need to check on someone in Boston, I recommend Safe And Well. Just please don't go to the site unless you actually need to check on someone. The servers don't need the added load (which I guess would be a reason to want to use Google, but they aren't going to be on scene like the Red Cro…

Google has now added a link to Red Cross's Safe and Well.

Re: Person Finder: Boston Marathon Explosions

#27

Post by jarek »

jmillikin wrote: post #24
nnutter wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Until Google decides to close it a few years from now in order to focus on what matters.

There is no need to run a person finder for longer than the duration of the disaster.

We've had wars that run for decades, a timespan in which it's definitely possible for a company to lose interest (or even cease to operate altogether). Thankfully this doesn't seem to be an issue as long as the company running it uses the open data format as pointed out by magicalist.

Re: Person Finder: Boston Marathon Explosions

#29

Post by eliben »

DanielStraight wrote: post #2

The Red Cross already does this. It's called Safe And Well. This is one place where we definitely don't need fragmentation. If you need to check on someone in Boston, I recommend Safe And Well. Just please don't go to the site unless you actually need to check on someone. The servers don't need the added load (which I guess would be a reason to want to use Google, but they aren't going to be on scene like the Red Cro…

For the sake of fairness, do a google search on "boston bomb" or similar and see what it shows (spoiler: there's a link to Red Cross too).
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