Google seeks to limit ‘right to be forgotten’ by claiming it’s journalistic • Hacker News Board

Re: Google seeks to limit ‘right to be forgotten’ by claiming it’s journalistic

#311

Post by greglindahl » Sat, Apr 07, 2018, 4:28 PM UTC

askmike wrote: post #281

greglindahl wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Search engines only show what's posted by other people, so while they're a convenient target, they aren't the actual bad actor. Our legal system tends to attack actual bad actors, not convenient targets. Unless the Internet is involved. The way RTBF and DMCA work, search engines bear 100% of the cost, and people don't ever go after the actual bad actors. By the way, in the US, if Tabloid X publishes Eric's photo, tha…

> Europe doesn't have free speech, so, no problem. Europe definitely has free speech (all the countries I know of anyway, Europe has a lot of different countries). There is just a different definition of what exactly is free speech and what is something else (some racist things are not considered free speech).

RTBF is Europe-wide, you have courts that make precedents like that which are Europe-wide even though Europe has a lot of different countries.

And sure, I'm sure you'd call what you have free speech. But that's not the way the US defines it.

Re: Google seeks to limit ‘right to be forgotten’ by claiming it’s journalistic

#312

Post by greglindahl » Sat, Apr 07, 2018, 4:30 PM UTC

DanBC wrote: post #277

greglindahl wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Search engines only show what's posted by other people, so while they're a convenient target, they aren't the actual bad actor. Our legal system tends to attack actual bad actors, not convenient targets. Unless the Internet is involved. The way RTBF and DMCA work, search engines bear 100% of the cost, and people don't ever go after the actual bad actors. By the way, in the US, if Tabloid X publishes Eric's photo, tha…

> Europe doesn't have free speech, so, no problem. No-where[1] has the US's extremist version of freedom of speech. Europe has a different form of free speech, and in this example Eric's right to be forgotton probably doesn't trump Someone's right to publish true information. I guess there'd be some judicial attempt to balance these two rights: Does Eric pose a continuing risk to the public from drunk driving? Is Eri…

You missed my actual point, which is that the search engine is just showing what a website published. RTBF attacks the search engine in that case, not the actual website.

Re: Google seeks to limit ‘right to be forgotten’ by claiming it’s journalistic

#313

Post by joshuamorton » Sat, Apr 07, 2018, 4:51 PM UTC

hyperpape wrote: post #214

Dylan16807 wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you need to know about their parking tickets or embezzlement, though? Or that time they partied too hard 25 years ago? Outside of specific circumstances, having every mistake you've ever made accessible at a glance is not really good for society.

I can understand the case for allowing someone to have their speeding tickets forgotten, but if you believe that, the correct response is that the government shouldn’t publish speeding tickets. (I could be wrong, but I think parking tickets are aren’t published in the US, while speeding tickets are).

I don't believe even most speeding tickets are a matter of public record, as citations and not criminal proceedings.

Re: Google seeks to limit ‘right to be forgotten’ by claiming it’s journalistic

#314

Post by greglindahl » Sat, Apr 07, 2018, 6:17 PM UTC

Tehnix wrote: post #309

greglindahl wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was asking you why. As a search engine developer, I'm very aware that the EU is trying to put me out of business before I start. And yes, the DMCA is also a barrier to entry for search engines, but at least it's one that I understand well.

I think the EU is very aware that in the reality we live in, search engines are how people find stuff, not by looking through or searching directly on sites. Thus, this is one of those times where the lawmakers actually looked at technology, and understood how it was used. Also, making search engines responsible creates a far smaller surface area of contact than having every site that contains the content.

RTBF wasn't invented by lawmakers, it was invented by a European court.

Re: Google seeks to limit ‘right to be forgotten’ by claiming it’s journalistic

#315

Post by DanBC » Sat, Apr 07, 2018, 6:45 PM UTC

greglindahl wrote: post #312

DanBC wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Europe doesn't have free speech, so, no problem. No-where[1] has the US's extremist version of freedom of speech. Europe has a different form of free speech, and in this example Eric's right to be forgotton probably doesn't trump Someone's right to publish true information. I guess there'd be some judicial attempt to balance these two rights: Does Eric pose a continuing risk to the public from drunk driving? Is Eri…

You missed my actual point, which is that the search engine is just showing what a website published. RTBF attacks the search engine in that case, not the actual website.

And you've missed the point that RTBF isn't automatic, and that it is balanced against the right for search engines to publish information.

Re: Google seeks to limit ‘right to be forgotten’ by claiming it’s journalistic

#316

Post by obmelvin » Sat, Apr 07, 2018, 6:57 PM UTC

bringtheaction wrote: post #207

gray_-_wolf wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That said, it would be nice if there was an easy way to turn off this search personalization on a search-by-search basis it is, it's called anonymous window

You are talking about incognito mode / private browsing right? When I open an incognito tab and search for “latex”, the entire first page of results is still all about LaTeX for me and I would bet my left hand that this is not universally true. In other words, you are still seeing personalized results.

Yup, I tried the same thing. I would guess they are still doing some sort of server-side personalization and/or identification, they just don't continue to track you via cookies. For me it wasn't that surprising, I tried doing this from an IP address associated with a large CS dept.

Re: Google seeks to limit ‘right to be forgotten’ by claiming it’s journalistic

#317

Post by lloyddobbler » Sat, Apr 07, 2018, 7:41 PM UTC

BookmarkSaver wrote: post #203

Heliosmaster wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A search engine != the internet. It should not be removed from the internet, but it should be removed from google. It's not the same thing as dealing with paper newspaper. One you have to go an explicitly look for the information and browse through them to get it (and still it can escape your gaze). With google you just need to type name and surname, and everything is at your fingertips.

But how is it ok or reasonable to say "you are allowed to see this, but we're going to make laws to make it arbitrarily hard to do". Either it's removing public information (censorship), or it's this bizarre stop-gap to allow people to conceal information while pretending they aren't deleting it. There's not reasonable or principled system here. Just a dangerous stop-gap measure where it seems like people are trying…

Agreed. Further along those lines, how does one reconcile the fact that Google still powers search for a number of other entities (including some libraries, academic institutions, etc)?

The "right to be forgotten", in that case, becomes the "right to erase history."

Re: Google seeks to limit ‘right to be forgotten’ by claiming it’s journalistic

#318

Post by greglindahl » Sat, Apr 07, 2018, 8:28 PM UTC

DanBC wrote: post #315

greglindahl wrote: post #312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You missed my actual point, which is that the search engine is just showing what a website published. RTBF attacks the search engine in that case, not the actual website.

And you've missed the point that RTBF isn't automatic, and that it is balanced against the right for search engines to publish information.

With all of the cost pushed on the search engine. Which is a huge barrier to entry, yet Europe says it wants more search engines.

BTW, search engines don't "publish" information in the US sense of the word. The way Russia forces Yandex to self-censor is that Yandex is liable for everything they show to users. That's 'publishing' in the US sense. Newspapers have publishers, and the publisher is the person you sue if you think the newspaper has libeled you.

Meanwhile, Europe (mostly) doesn't consider RTBF to be censorship because it only involves censoring search engines and not newspapers. Except that people are filing RTBF against newspaper site search, too.

Re: Google seeks to limit ‘right to be forgotten’ by claiming it’s journalistic

#319

Post by khedoros1 » Sat, Apr 07, 2018, 8:33 PM UTC

petre wrote: post #260

lordCarbonFiber wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well maybe Eric shouldn't have "driven drunk"? Im not sure why search providers should be held accountable for protecting the carefully curated (false) reputations of individuals. All of the "right to be forgotten" arguments seem to devolve to "people shouldn't be able to know any data points that would negatively effect my social standings".

What if someone posts libelous information about Eric and uses SEO to make it show up on page 1 of Google's search results?

Depends if in the scenario you're imagining, "libelous" implies false, or just damaging.

Re: Google seeks to limit ‘right to be forgotten’ by claiming it’s journalistic

#320

Post by dragonwriter » Sun, Apr 08, 2018, 12:05 AM UTC

greglindahl wrote: post #308

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> how is the DMCA this way? Certainly not the takedown notice/counternotice provision, which doesn't create new liability, only a special shield from any pre-existing liability. The problem is that the shield has value to the search engine in excess of the cost to the search engine (but not the cost to the censorship victim) of removing the information. It reduces their risk, even when the risk is low because they wo…

The DMCA causes huge costs for search engines because of all of the bogus takedowns, which people can send without any consequences. Congress could fix that aspect of the law, but has chosen not to.

> The DMCA causes huge costs for search engines because of all of the bogus takedowns

The search engine could ignore all takedowns and be in exactly the same situation as it would be without the DMCA; the safe harbor provision isn't a mandate on them, it is a benefit to them. They deal with takedowns because the cost of doing so is less than the cost of copyright liability they would have without the DMCA, which means the DMCA is saving them money, not imposing a cost.