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‘We’re taking a look’ at whether Google searches should be regulated

washingtonpost.com

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Re: ‘We’re taking a look’ at whether Google searches should be regulated

#41

Post by [deleted] »

acomjean wrote: post #36
toomuchtodo wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Good luck with that. The US government is able to enforce sanctions on other governments , crushing their economies and major businesses. It's able to acquire private property and businesses through eminent domain. "Good luck with that" is a bit shortsighted. The tools exist for the US to exert these forces, and they have been used successfully.

That was a bit glib. I removed that line. The US tends to treat its own companies with kid gloves and tends not to put the hammer down on billion dollar companies with their all important lobbyists.

[deleted]

Re: ‘We’re taking a look’ at whether Google searches should be regulated

#42

Post by jklinger410 »

econ4all wrote: post #18

Before he was president or even running for office he'd call into a fox news show and say something stupid and other news outlets would pick it up and I remember being annoyed and thinking "why is this news?!" now he's president and everything he says is news and it hurts my soul. Anyway we live in a free country and the government can't dictate what kind of news a search engine should surface. It's ironic though tha…

>Anyway we live in a free country and the government can't dictate what kind of news a social media site should surface.

But we're doing this one.

Re: ‘We’re taking a look’ at whether Google searches should be regulated

#43

Post by ocdtrekkie »

sct202 wrote: post #25
ocdtrekkie wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The solution is to mandate that Google publicly disclose their algorithms and the various weightings they apply to incentivize behavior and how much of an impact they have. Then everyone can see whether or not their behavior constitutes unfair bias, can test for themselves what's going on. Google does not need or deserve the ability to keep the way all human knowledge is accessed and found today a trade secret. Addit…

Good luck with that and prepare for their search results to be overrun by content farms and stores SEOing their websites to the spec.

I think that would suggest that Google's protection against content farms and bad SEO is way more simplistic than it probably is. Sure, like security in the open source world, transparency would make it possible for bad actors to find flaws in their code, but it would similarly allow others to find and disclose to Google those flaws and offer suggestions on how to fix them.

Re: ‘We’re taking a look’ at whether Google searches should be regulated

#44

Post by Yoric »

jiojfdsal3 wrote: post #7

To me, this is a strong sign of Google manipulating search results. https://www.google.com/search?q=american+inventors https://www.google.com/search?q=american+mathematicians https://www.google.com/search?q=american+scientists Image results: https://www.google.com/search?q=european+art+history&tbm=isc... https://www.google.com/search?q=white+couple&tbm=isch https://www.google.com/search?q=white+inventor&tbm=isch

Well, it looks like it's taken straight from Wikipedia...

Re: ‘We’re taking a look’ at whether Google searches should be regulated

#45

Post by econ4all »

jklinger410 wrote: post #42
econ4all wrote: post #18

Before he was president or even running for office he'd call into a fox news show and say something stupid and other news outlets would pick it up and I remember being annoyed and thinking "why is this news?!" now he's president and everything he says is news and it hurts my soul. Anyway we live in a free country and the government can't dictate what kind of news a search engine should surface. It's ironic though tha…

>Anyway we live in a free country and the government can't dictate what kind of news a social media site should surface. But we're doing this one.

The US government is doing that?

Re: ‘We’re taking a look’ at whether Google searches should be regulated

#46

Post by sp332 »

acomjean wrote: post #40
sp332 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't put together your first paragraph with your second. Why do you say "good luck with that" while also acknowledging that it already happens?

"adjusting the algorithm" is something they do all the time. Then the algorithm is to blame or credit for search rank, they're not choosing winners and losers.

What would be the point of adjusting the algorithm other than picking which results should be surfaced? That's what the algorithm does, that's its whole raison d'être. And in addition to the algorithm, Google has a substantial block list which is different for different regions.

Re: ‘We’re taking a look’ at whether Google searches should be regulated

#47

Post by quotemstr »

senthil_rajasek wrote: post #39

I think it's appropriate to quote Vint Cerf here, "The internet is a reflection of our society and that mirror is going to be reflecting what we see. If we do not like what we see in that mirror the problem is not to fix the mirror, we have to fix society." ―Vint Cerf https://icannwiki.org/Vinton_Cerf

Conversely, if you're unsatisfied with yourself, making your mirror distort your reflection will only make things worse.

I reserve a special level of contempt for people who think they can "fix" society by using force or authority to control how other people think, speak, and feel.

Re: ‘We’re taking a look’ at whether Google searches should be regulated

#48

Post by tntn »

api wrote: post #26
jiojfdsal3 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd assume the greatest search engineers in the world would know how to distinguish people searching between the two phrases.

Any search algorithm will introduce some kind of bias. People will notice this bias and assume a conspiracy because humans like to read purpose and intent into everything. If all the results were white males, people would be accusing Google of sexism and racism. If the results skewed toward Asians people would think Google was in league with the Chinese government or something. This is one of the social dangers of al…

> This is actually one of the dangers of AI: it might introduce all kinds of weird biases that we're not even aware of until the effect has already been felt.

This isn't a danger of AI in the future, it's a danger of google's algorithms in the present. Most users (myself included) have come to treat Google results as some oracle of truth, so the bias introduced by Google's existing search algorithms can have tremendous impact. Most of the time it will go unnoticed, and it doesn't require any intentional manipulation. What people know, and how they act based on what they know, is being heavily influenced already by google's algorithms.

Re: ‘We’re taking a look’ at whether Google searches should be regulated

#49

Post by mudil »

jiojfdsal3 wrote: post #7

To me, this is a strong sign of Google manipulating search results. https://www.google.com/search?q=american+inventors https://www.google.com/search?q=american+mathematicians https://www.google.com/search?q=american+scientists Image results: https://www.google.com/search?q=european+art+history&tbm=isc... https://www.google.com/search?q=white+couple&tbm=isch https://www.google.com/search?q=white+inventor&tbm=isch

Haha! This is hilarious!

Re: ‘We’re taking a look’ at whether Google searches should be regulated

#50

Post by creaghpatr »

quotemstr wrote: post #23
creaghpatr wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think OPs point is somewhat corroborated by the choices of Google Doodle, both in who they select and who they omit.

In a sense, it doesn't matter whether the curious "american inventors" search results set comes out of political bias or technical inadequacy: from the perspective of many people, Google's editorial choices in certain areas have forfeited the benefit of the doubt in others. This situation is a good example of why it's important to pay attention to maintaining the appearance of impartiality as well as actually being i…

Yup, that's a better summary of what I'm saying
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